


Boba Fett: Work Never Ends

by jedilordrevan



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Legends - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blood and Gore, Bounty Hunters, Character Death, Horror, Monsters, Science Fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-06
Updated: 2020-09-06
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:40:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 33,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26315827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jedilordrevan/pseuds/jedilordrevan
Summary: Fate had tried to kill Boba Fett with the sarlacc, but he was too strong willed to allow a fungus to end him. He forced his way out and found himself in a very different galaxy with very different rulers. And with all his previous clients dead, it became time to find new ones. And boy, did they have quite the mission for him.
Comments: 2
Kudos: 7
Collections: Fanfic Roulette 2020 Round 3





	1. Unlucky Enough to Live

**Boba Fett:  
Work Never Ends  
** **M.C. Deltat**

A sarlacc is an almost semi-sentient omnivorous creature found on several planets throughout the galaxy. While best suited for wet environments, a sarlacc can survive in just about every conceivable environment: arboreal, oceanic, volcanic, desert. As long as it can eat, it can thrive. How it eats, well that is a story of terror. Anything unfortunate enough to fall into a sarlac’s beaks will be forced to endure over 1000 years of suffering – both mental and physical. Afterall, just eating its prey is not enough for the great sarlacc. Indeed, as you are trapped within the mighty beast, you will be tormented with visions of fear and malevolence so that it could feed off the terror.  
That mental anguish continues for the entire duration of your time in the sarlacc… and that duration is long. This being’s digestion has evolved to deliberately keep any victims alive for as long as the digestion takes. The sarlacc makes sure that this process is as physically painful as possible. Each stomach of a sarlacc is lined with barbed tentacles which embed themselves into the prey’s skin and muscles before fixing them into the walls. Those tentacles then inject neurotoxins and acid into the prey to keep everything immobile and in torment. Then digestion occurs.

Due to the slow nature of the ‘processes’ occurring in a sarlaccs stomach, it isn’t uncommon for the average stomach to become full of prey. In such situations, sarlacc will just grow a new stomach to ensure that it can continue to capture and devour its food; layers upon layers of stomachs full of sentience being brutalized. On average, it can be expected that any ancient sarlacc will have around 30 stomachs.

Boba Fett had finally reached the final stomach. 

Mandalorian iron, capable of resisting lightsabers, proved to be a challenge for the great sarlacc of Tatooine. Unable to directly spike through the iron with its tendrils, the sarlacc had determined to just trap Boba deep within a stomach and delay. It would wait for powerful acid to eat through the irritating armor protecting its prey. The sarlacc was hopeful that its visions of terror would pacify Boba long enough for the process to complete. However, for a man who had been in the presence of Darth Vader, one of the evilest men in the entire galaxy, terror was nothing new.

With an iron will as durable as his armor, Boba continued on. Resolute in his quest not to be eaten, Boba opened fire inside the sarlac.

“Eat this, you overgrown fungus.” Boba yelled.

Every pace forward proved challenging for Boba as the sarlacc’s very being resisted the escape attempt. Each footstep brought forth countless surging tentacles, shifting walls of flesh, fresh acidic assaults, and other such nightmares. The great beast used everything it had to keep its meal down.

It wasn’t enough; this Mandalorian was stubborn. From behind his protective helmet, Boba Fett forced himself to look forward; no matter the terrors that the sarlacc threw at him. To look away was to die. To look away was to fall prey to the visions of terror; to his dad’s death. To look away was to stop moving forward. Boba didn’t look away. He welcomed all that the sarlacc had to throw at him. The sarlacc did not disappoint.

With a deep breath of stale processed air from his mask’s filter, Boba evaded the attacking tentacles as he reloaded the heat sink on his blaster rifle. With a satisfying click, Boba resumed his fire. Normally quite precise, he didn’t waste too much effort on aiming. As far as he was concerned, he would either hit his targets or he would hit the poor bastards currently being eaten. Both would hurt the sarlacc; both were fine with him.

His theory was proven correct after each attacking tentacle exploded in a blast of gore and acid. The very flesh of the sarlacc shivered as its primitive consciousness attempted to process all the damage that Boba had caused during his escape.

“Ha,” Boba chuckled. “You finally get sick of me? Well don’t worry, I’ll be out of you in a moment.” He could tell that he was almost out of the final stomach. “Pay attention to who you eat in the future.”

Boba ignited his jetpack for the final stretch of the journey. “I will hurt just as much going out as I did coming in.” he remarked. Before leaving Boba took a moment to glance at his surroundings. He could see countless other trapped victims. Their mouths open in a silent torment that told Boba more than any actual screams could. He would leave them to their fates.

Looking back towards the throat of the sarlacc, Boba flew aggressively to escape. While he was hesitant to use his many weapons at the start of the journey, Boba attacked without hesitation now. At the sites of the many impacts, Boba saw what he assumed was either leaking blood or leaking mucus; He didn’t slow down to investigate.

From the thermals coming in through his visor, Boba could also see the desert air coming in through the sarlacc’s beak. As he approached closer, Boba decided to initialize the missile on his jetpack; he wasn’t going to risk his ultimate escape.

“This will hurt for only a moment.” Boba said. He fired his rocket straight to the top. Only a moment after firing, a great and thunderous explosion rocked the sarlacc’s entire being. Boba could see the remaining shards of the sarlacc’s beak bordering its newly made hole. Without hesitation, he pushed his jetpack far past safety specs and made his way to escape.

Just as Boba passed through the threshold however, he discovered that the sarlacc still hadn’t quite given up on eating him. Scores of tendrils leaped to grasp onto Boba’s armored body. With great difficulty, Boba aimed his currently restrained arm towards the remains of the sarlacc’s beak and activated his flamethrower. White hot flames poured out of a nozzle onto the sarlacc. What wasn’t immediately disintegrated from the flames began to melt. With great apparent regret, the sarlacc had no choice but to give up on its Mandalorian.

Boba flew out of the great scar upon the desert with his sputtering jetpack, and landed onto the surrounding sand of the Northern Dune Sea. With the escape finally over, his adrenaline rush died and he immediately collapsed onto his knees. After catching himself with his hands, Boba ripped off his helmet and vomited onto the dry cool sand.

Once Boba was done purging, he fell back onto his bottom and just sat. He wiped the sweat from his forehead and enjoyed his first large breathes of the clean, unfiltered air. After being trapped in the sarlacc, the privilege to relax for a moment was a great gift. As he relaxed, his gaze began to wander around. Due to his vomiting, Boba only just noticed now that his escape coincided with the setting of the twin suns.

“Thanks to small blessings, I guess,” Boba muttered. It definitely wouldn’t have been as easy to sit and relax if both twin suns were still beaming tall in the sky. After catching his breath, he stood up and stretched. He began to look over his armor; it had served him well while he was trapped in the bowels of the sarlacc, but it was very clearly damaged beyond repair. With massive scars and holes all over the plate in varying sizes, Boba could tell that it would be impossible to fix. It might not even worth lugging the extra weight through the desert to be honest.

After considering the way forward, Boba made his decision. With a grim nod, he began to undo his armor. Boba slowly ripped off every last bit off blighted armor from his body; the chest plate, the pauldron, the vambraces, every last bit had to come off. He would keep some sarlacc souvenirs though. Wasn’t even hard due to all the pieces of sarlacc flesh stuck to the armor.

It was during Boba’s self-appointed task that he finally had the clarity of thought to regret his sloppiness. He had gotten too confident after capturing Han Solo. And he had not expected anything to happen when in Jabba’s presence. Falling into the sarlacc definitely was something he wouldn’t be able to just ignore in the future; the other hunters wouldn’t let him. And even if they did, he refused to forget anyway. He was defeated by less than a dozen people; less than a dozen. And he had paid a cost. He looked back to his armor as he removed it. Truthfully, a lot of it was holding on mostly due to faith as opposed to any of the existing physical connections. Frankly, his touch seemed enough to cause several pieces to simply fall by themselves.

Boba sighed. He would have to be better in the future. His reputation as a bounty hunter depended on it. After he tossed away his last piece of armor, he kneeled down to pick up his discarded helmet. He looked deeply into the mirrored visor.

“I’m not dead yet Dad,” Boba whispered. “I can keep going.”

Boba stopped focusing just on the visor and began to look at the helmet overall. “Man,” Boba scoffed. “This is shit now too.” Much like his armor, his helmet was also deeply coated in scars and rot; the visor was cracked in a bunch of places too.

“Garbage. It can reflect lightsabers but fungus juice is just too much I guess,” Boba chuckled. Boba tossed the helmet away. The helmet fell onto the sand and began to roll away. It continued until it seemingly stopped out of nowhere with an audible clang.

“Wait” Boba exclaimed. “What was that?” Boba walked over to where the helmet currently rested. He picked up the helmet and used it as a shovel to get some of the sand away. After a few moments of digging Boba found… something. It was a large piece of steel and it looked pretty rough from all the sandblasting that the desert had inflicted upon it. He bent down to try to get a closer look and find some identifiable markers. After a few seconds of inspection, Boba was flabbergasted.

“Fuck,” Boba laughed. “This really was a bad job wasn’t it?” On the piece of exposed steel, Boba could clearly identify The Hutt iconography. This was fucking Jabba the fucking Hutt’s yacht. And it was destroyed and buried in the middle of some desert in Tatooine. “Well, at least there is no one alive to remember me falling into that damn plant.” Boba considered.

Boba started to comb through the area. He figured he could probably find some supplies to help him get to Mos Eisley. From there, he would get a ride to Anchorhead and then use his ship to get off this damn planet. He wanted to just go, hopefully somewhere without sand; he was honestly starting to really hate sand.

Unfortunately, to Boba’s shock, it appeared that nothing was as shallow as the first piece he found. Every single blaster, or ration, or armor piece required plenty of careful digging. To make it worse, it was all drenched and coated with sand. He understood that dust storms happened frequently on this planet, but this was a little ridiculous. 

“How fucking long was I in that thing?” Boba yelled. He had thought that he resisted the sarlacc’s visions well enough; But maybe he didn’t. There definitely seem to be some memories in his head that aren’t from his perspective. A lot of stuff that didn’t actually happen to him. “More time than I thought must have passed,” Boba admitted. “I need to move.” After a more rigorous search, Boba was finally found enough equipment to satisfy himself. Using the stars and the moon as a guide, Boba begin to walk forward; as he always has.

As it turned out, however, the desert is a rough place to travel. Even with the tolerable night temperatures, fighting through the sand proved to be a struggle on foot. To make matters worse, Boba wasn’t exactly sure how far away Mos Eisley actually was. All he could do was march. And he did, at least until he saw the first of the twin suns begin to rise. And as the temperature slowly began to rise, Boba decided that taking a break would be a good idea; traveling during the night and sleeping during the day would work. After leaning against a giant rock, Boba closed his eyes and hoped that he wouldn’t have any nightmares.

Less than 30 minutes later, Boba eyes shot open and he frowned as he realized that his mind let him down. He brought up his hands and started to rub his eyes clear.

“Well, at least I won’t have any nightmares about dad dying anymore. Now I get to enjoy the fears of every single thing that got eaten by that fungus instead.” Boba commented. “Well, if I can’t sleep, I guess I’ll just wait for the night.” Boba brought his hands back down and closed his eyes. Moments later, his eyes thundered open once more as his hunter’s instinct screamed at him. There was someone here; there was someone stalking him. A giant grin appeared on his face. Whoever is here, they must not know who he is. Boba shot up and climbed on top of the rock. This was a desert after all; it’s pretty hard to hide when there is nothing to hide behind. He glared across the desert.

“Where are you?” Boba muttered. “I can feel you. I swear, you must be Sand people or something.” Boba’s eyes narrowed as he saw something flickering through the sand. “Fuck, it is Sand people” Boba whined. He frowned and muttered. “It’s easier just to be direct here.” After jumping off the rock, Boba took a deep breath and tried to remember the words; it was a real shame that his Tusken was sloppy. Although, he thinks that some of the memories he picked up in the sarlacc might have actually been a few unlucky Sand people. After putting some thought into how he wanted to say his piece, Boba began to talk loudly.

In a crude Tusken, Boba screamed, “Not enemy. No harm meant.” He then muttered under his breath in Basic, “Fuck, this language is annoying.”

“Oh frack,” a shocked Boba exclaimed. Almost as fast as he could blink, 7 sand people had him surrounded with their weapons raised. Using his limited vocabulary, Boba began to speak in Tusken again. “Escape Sarlacc. Try get to Mos Eisley”

The Sand people glanced at each other. One of them, Boba assumed he was the leader, stepped forward and pointed in the direction of the Sarlacc. “You escaped it? How? Did you kill the great one?”

Boba slowly put one hand into a pocket and took out a piece of the sarlacc beak. “I think. Hurt it a lot.” Boba mouthed out the rough syllables of Tusken.

The same Raider walked in front of Boba and held out his hand. Boba assumed he wanted the beak fragment and handed it over. The raider grabbed it and inspected it closer. After a while, he appeared satisfied and turned back to his compatriots and cheered. His cheering then initiated the cheering of the other sand people. He looked back at Boba. “Where do you want to go?” he asked.

“Mos Eisley.” Boba answered. The Sand person looked confused. “Of course, they wouldn’t know the name in basic. What is it called in Tusken?” Boba muttered. Suddenly, from a memory that wasn’t his, Boba remembered. Going back to speaking in Tusken, Boba repeated his destination. “Dowager Queen”. 

The Tusken Raider looked like he was aware of that name. He nodded. “As payment for killing the devil plant, we will take you there. Come.” He turned around and began to walk away while also gesturing Boba to follow.

With no better plan, Boba followed. After all, he would appreciate not having to walk the rest of the way there. After being led over the crest of the hill, he was brought to a small group of Sand People. They had a collection of Banthas and Dewbacks that they were tending too. This was probably a scout party he was lucky enough to cross paths with. The Raider that spoke to him went over to his party and began to explain the situation. They all glanced at him. Reluctantly, at least Boba assumed so, he was led to a Bantha. Everyone mounted up, along with Boba, and they began to head out. None of the Sand people bothered to speak to Boba during the trip to Mos Eisley. He figured that was because he still was an outsider. Frankly, he was happy to be ignored though; he really didn’t want to speak Tusken anymore.

\---------------------------------------------------------Line Break--------------------------------------------------------  
\-----------------------------------Some Time Later------------City of Mos Eisley----------------------------------

As he walked past the rusted gates into Mos Eisley, Boba figured that the Sand people probably had ulterior motives as to why they willingly transported him. More than likely, they did appreciate his assault upon the sarlacc, but honestly, their reputation does precede them; they don’t treat outsiders kindly. Truthfully, the fact that they have a massive enclave right outside the city was probably the bigger factor in keeping an eye on him. The Sand people were probably just making sure he wasn’t heading over to their home with the goal of massacring them like animals; and not just the men, but the women and the children too. His survival of the sarlacc probably made him appear more threatening as well. 

“Frankly, I don’t know why the Empire tolerated having a Sand people city so close to Mos Eisley anyway” Boba pondered. “Probably more trouble than it is worth.” He figured.

Boba banished the thoughts from his head, and continued on his walk to the closest bar. He would hitch a ride to Anchorhead eventually, but for now, he needed a drink. He turned a corner past a droid store and kept walking; he was pretty sure there was a bar here somewhere. If only there weren’t so many people milling about.

“Is the Empire giving out free food or something? Why are there so many people outside?” Boba griped. “Where is Motta’s Bar? Why does every single building look the same here?”

As Boba walked by the monotonous sandstone buildings, he grew irritated as he was forced to evade more and more people forming a great wall of stupid. As he reached the city center, he eventually began to hear cheering. Curious, but mostly because the bar was on the same route, Boba decided to walk deeper into the crowds.

“What are all these people happy about? Do they not know they all live on Tatooine. They shouldn’t be allowed to be happy.” Boba joked. Frankly, the cheering disgusted Boba.

As he pieced the crowd, he finally found the point of interest that had captured the attention of the people. It was a massive statue of Grand Moff Tarkin. Boba remembered someone mentioning it in Jabba’s palace a few years ago. It was apparently put up in memory of Tarkin’s death after the explosion of the first death star. Thinking about the first death star, Boba had to suppress a laugh. As he left Cloud City, he had heard rumors about the construction of a second Death Star.

“Hopefully, this time without a hole to the center,” Boba chuckled.

Ending his musings, Boba noticed that it probably wasn’t just the statue that was drawing the attention of the crowd. Rather, he assumed it was the many ropes all wrapped over its durasteel structure. Said ropes were currently under massive tension as scores upon scores of people struggled to tear it down.

“Good Luck with that,” Boba muttered. Capital ships are made using the same type of metal as that Tarkin Statue. It would take a lot more than 40 rowdy rebels tugging on a rope to tear it down. Frankly, Boba was wondering why all this was being allowed anyway. He began to pivot as he scanned for imperial stormtroopers; lesser grievances than this have been enough for the firing squads to come out. To Boba’s shock however, he couldn’t actually spot any Imperial forces here.

“Ah well,” Boba mused. “Not being paid to care anyway.” Through the people, Boba could finally see his destination. “Ah, there it is,” he thanked.

Boba was less kind than before as he pushed his way to the entrance. To his disappointment, however, it was just as rowdy and loud inside the bar as outside. Worse still, at least the people outside weren’t all drunk.

“Great,” Boba sarcastically muttered. He walked over to one of the open seats and sat down.

“What will you have?” a human bartender asked. 

“Something tall and vaguely life threatening.” Boba ordered. He took off his scavenged helmet and put it upon the counter. “Keep them coming too,” he added.

The bartender started pouring his drink. “You got it.”

Boba slid over a few credits as a payment for this drink, and those to come. As he brought the drink to his lips, he took a moment to appreciate the fact that he was still alive. His time in the Sarlacc had been complete shit. He hadn’t had a good drink in a long while either. As he sat at the counter, he tried to eavesdrop on what the surrounding people were talking about. Although, to be honest, it was really hard; people were screaming. There were so many people shouting, it was more than difficult to just isolate one person’s speech over the many. He was a professional though, and information gathering was a ‘required skill’. He heard a lot of words like ‘Free’, and ‘Fallen’, and ‘New Era’.

“Hey Barkeep,” Boba requested.

“You need another refill?” he asked.

“Well sure,” Boba finished the rest of his drink in one go. “But that wasn’t my question.” Boba gestured to the crowds. “Did something happen recently? What caused all this ‘celebrated’?” He asked.

The bartender had a shocked look on his face. “Have you been trapped in a pit for the last month or something?” He asked.

Boba had to suppress his annoyance. “In a manner of speaking.” He answered.

“Ah,” the Bartender reacted. “In that case, you missed a lot. The Emperor and Lord Vader have been killed by the Rebels.”

Boba paused his drinking. He placed his glass down and made sure to clarify. “I’m sorry. I’ve been having a rough time lately and I just want to double check that I didn’t just have stroke. Vader has been killed?”

The bartender nodded. “Yep. A rebel army led by Admiral Ackbar, General Solo, and General Organa led an attack on the Empire’s second Death Star. While that was happening, Master Jedi Skywalker killed both the Emperor and Vader.”

Boba had a hard time reacting to that. “Huh, thank you for the info.” He looked down at his drink. “Can I get another refill, and with something stronger this time?” He asked.

“Can do,” the bartender replied. “Go ahead and join the celebrating. A new chapter for the galaxy has begun.”

“Ya sure,” Boba dismissed the bartender. His mind was going a million parsecs a minute. The empire was overtaken by the very same crew who took down Jabba.

“Well, at least I lost to the winners,” Boba laughed. “Probably would have been more embarrassing if those assholes were killed. Now I can say that I survived an encounter with the slayers of the Lords of the Empire.” Boba chuckled and then he thought for a moment. “Ya, I really was unlucky with the job; and now both Jabba and Vader are dead.” Boba mused, “Well luckily, most people don’t know my face; They only know my armor… which is somewhere in the desert, and digested.”

Boba pivoted on the bar stool and began to search through the crowds for a target. “Fuck it, fun times make for loose lips and even looser habits. Let’s see if I can hear anything,” Boba decided internally. He figured with how many people were out and about, there was sure to be something useful here; whether in terms of gear or contracts. The celebration would only make his goal easier. Alcohol and joy create extremely easy targets; no one pays much attention to anything with this much euphoria in the air.

Boba took another sip of his drink and closed his eyes. Focusing on the many conversations in the room, he tried to see if there was anything interesting to hear.

“Let’s see, what do we have?” Boba wondered. “Pod racing, no” Boba shifted his focus from person to person. “Cargo transportation, spice running, dancing… that one is a definite no.” Then something popped up that captured Boba’s attention. “Wait, did I hear someone mention an HK-77 droid?”. He turned his head to a table in the corner of the bar. Sitting there was a blue skinned twi'lek male and a red-haired human male in old, old clone trooper armor. They were sitting really close to each other and It could have not been more obvious that they were trying to hide something.

“Rookies,” Boba scoffed. “What yall got?” He listened, thankful for the loose atmosphere. People tend to have trouble controlling their own volume when in a loud environment. “Let’s see, the human stole a bounty request from a destroyed HK-77 droid. Blah blah blah, opportunity for better life. Oh,” Boba smiled, “And it’s a request from the New Republic.” Boba pivoted back to the bar counter; Now he was interested. “Barkeep,” He called. “I’m feeling festive. Drinks for everyone in the bar.” He handed over the credits. As the barkeep got the attention of the rest of the bar patrons, Boba smiled, he wouldn’t have to wait long.

\---------------------------------------------------------Line Break--------------------------------------------------------  
\---------------------------------30 min later----------------City of Mos Eisley------------------------------------

“Alcohol really is the best friend of a bounty hunter looking for an easy mark,” Boba thought. The two aspiring hunters, who started reserved, slowly got more and more sloppy as the free drinks entered the equation. Boba had been waiting for 30 minutes and was now sure that these two kids had no idea what they were getting into. Although, he did figure that many bounty hunters started out this way; most people just start with lighter jobs than markers taken off the bodies of dead Hunter Killer droids. These kids would probably get themselves killed.

And at the sight of said kids standing up to waddle out of the bar, Boba smiled. “Don’t worry, I’ll educate you.” 

He waited for them to leave before he also got up and followed. Based on what he heard, he was pretty sure that the wannabe trooper was holding onto the mark. So that was whom he followed.

As he stepped outside, the first thing he noticed was that it was significantly darker. The second thing he noticed was that the statue of Tarkin was still standing. It seemed that after a lot of futile pulling, the people decided to just give up and paint all over it instead.

“Dumbasses,” Boba muttered. He started to look around. “Now where is my dumbass?” That newbie was wearing clonetrooper armor, and Boba did not think he would be difficult to identify.

“Ah, there you are,” Boba said as he began to shadow him. “And he is even walking into the alleyway. Easy.” Boba walked faster to catch up. He could tell that the rookie clearly thought he was being stealthy, but instead he was isolating himself to anyone who cared enough to watch. Within a few moments, Boba was directly behind him. Boba took a deep breath and … acted. As fast as one could blink, Boba ripped the helmet off the human and knocked up out with a swift hit to the back of head. He caught the body so that it wouldn’t make any noise and dragged him deeper into the alleyway. Boba propped up the body and started to search it.

“Let’s see what you brought me friend.” Boba mocked. “Oh, swoop bike keys, don’t mind if I do. I appreciate you donating your ride to me.” He continued to search deeper. “There we go.” Boba had finally found the marker. “Now let’s see what we got.” He activated the holographic display and started reading the mission details. “New Republic commission requests a search and capture of a critical item currently on a rogue ship. Only experienced hunters accepted, come to Anchorhead for details.” Boba paused. “Now why are they in Anchorhead instead of Bestine.” Boba pondered. “Do they perhaps need some filth that wouldn’t be allowed to stain the floors of the capital city?” Boba joked. “Oh well, I am interested. This is good.” He pocketed the marker and began to leave. As he left, he spoke to the currently unconscious boy, “Find a new job. This one is ruthless.”

\---------------------------------------------------------Line Break--------------------------------------------------------  
\------------------------------------1 Day Later------------City of Anchorhead-------------------------------------

Anchorhead, founded as a mining town, was one of the first settlements on Tatooine. Over the course of its long history, it has been abandoned and re-settled countless times. Now-a-days, not much is mined anymore. Rather, it’s just seen as an alternative starport to Mos Eisley; a more expensive one anyway. And as Boba Fett zoomed through the city on his swoop bike, he could appreciate how much cleaner this city was. For what such a title is worth on this desert planet of Tatooine anyway. However, make no mistake, Anchorhead is still far closer to Mos Eisley in status than it is to the capital Bestine. At the end of the day, Anchorhead is just a more expensive Mos Eisley. The filth is still here, but it’s a more high-class level of filth.

For Boba, who was currently pulling into the docks, that larger expense was usually worth it. Back in Mos Eisley, it wasn’t uncommon to find some pirate gang trying to annex your ship, or some jawas stripping your ship for parts, or maybe just one unlucky firefight destroying your stuff due to misplaced shots. Boba had seen it happen to other Bounty Hunters and he decided to be smart. After a certain point, the increased cost is justified by the decreased risk; at least Boba though so.

Boba finally pulled into the bay where his ship was and saw a bunch of mooks loitering near the entrance.

He sighed. “Well, I guess rats always manage to get onto even the cleanest ships.” He looked at the 4 standing in front of the gate. He owned this particular hanger; it was a gift from Jabba the Hutt after he became the arena champion. As such, they were loitering in front of his property. Boba wasn’t a fan of that.

“Who are you and what do you want?” Boba challenged.

One of the street rats stepped forward, proud of himself with his chin held up high. “We are the personal crew of ‘The Boba Fett’. You better watch yourself; we could get you killed.”

Boba sighed. “Look I am not in the mood. Leave” He ordered.

Another of the street rats laughed. “Ha. That would be funny if you were dressed in something other than your sandy garbage. What, did you scavenge it yourself from the ruins of Jabba’s palace?”

Boba would never confirm that; even under literal torture. Instead, Boba voiced a muted, “3”.

The third street rat decided to add to the conversation. “Do you have bantha poodoo in your head. Are you trying to count us? There are 4 of us.”

“2,” Boba said.

The final street rat finally found his voice. “Are you trying to threaten us? Did you not hear that we work for Boba Fett?”

“1,” Boba continued. He took a deep breathe since he was sure that the thugs wouldn’t take the chance he was giving them.

The first leader street rat stepped right up to Boba. Face to helmet, the thug tried to be threatening. “Seems like his thing has trouble listening. In fact, he probably has trouble thinking as well.” He turned around and looked at his fellow thugs. “But let’s not bother Fett with this. We can do it ourselves.”

“0” Boba finished. Before the thug could turn back around, Boba sprung into action. His left arm shot out and wrapped itself around the thug’s neck. It then promptly brought him closer to act as a living shield. The second arm drew a pistol and immediately fired off three shots. All three collapsed to the floor; each head still steaming from a single blaster bolt to the head.

The remaining thug, still held in place, started to panic at the display of skill. “Uh, uh, what are you doing? Didn’t we tell you that we work for Boba Fett? He’ll come after you. Just let me go, and he will never find out about this.” He begged.

Right next to his ear, Boba whispered, “Too late.” The terror on the man’s face grew as he was hit with the revelation. Before he could beg anymore though, Boba had brought the pistol up to the man’s temple and fired. Another steaming body dropped to the floor; this one didn’t have a head anymore though.

Boba looked for the nearest protocol droid. Upon seeing one trundling over, likely due to hearing the blaster fire, Boba gestured towards the bodies. “Droid. I was told that this hanger was secure. How did these blighters get in here?”

The droid reached Boba. Its eyes glowed red as it scanned him to confirm his identity. After a moment, satisfied with the results of the scan, the eyes shifted back to blue. “Dreadfully sorry Mr. Fett.” It placidly stated. “Due to reports of your death, maybe have been trying to stake a claim on your ship. Those organics were likely waiting for first preference.” Upon hearing Boba scoff, the droid added, “Do not worry about it, Mr. Fett. I will update your status to alive. And get someone to remove the corpses.”

Boba pondered for a moment. “Would it be better to keep my record as dead?” he asked himself. After a few seconds, he shook his head. “No, that is below me.” He finished in his head. “Yes, do that.” Boba ordered the droid.

As the droid waddled away, Boba walked up to the hanger doors. Once he inputted his biometrics into the sensors, the doors shot open. Going past the threshold, Boba could finally see his ship, The Slave I. Thankful for finally reaching some safe territory, Boba quickly jogged to it. The ship, recognizing its master, automatically lowered the doors to allow him in. Boba walked in. Finally inside, the first thing Boba did was take a seat and relax. He took off his scavenged gear and inspected his body. All his underarmor was scratched and damaged from whatever the plate mail couldn’t absorb. Slowly, he stripped while investigating his reserve supplies. Fortunately, he didn’t lose anything critical to the sarlacc. Most of his really good stuff was safe upon the ship; he never considered that he would need the fancy shit while safe with Jabba. In retrospect, Boba wasn’t sure if it would have helped or not.

“Eh, what’s done is done.” Boba shrugged and began to restock. He took out his backup model of armor. It was still a Mandalorian set like his old one, but a different color scheme. The armor was a red and blue base, instead of the green and silver base his prior set was. Also, it wasn’t scratched up beyond belief like his old set. For all intents and purposes, this was a ‘new’ set of armor.

“How obvious would it be that I am in here?” he pondered. “Ah well. I won’t hide myself on purpose.”

After putting on his armor, Boba then moved onto his weapons. After re-equipping himself with his needed items: new rifle, pistol, grenade launcher, and a few useful pieces stolen from certain deceased warriors, Boba stepped outside. He locked up his ship and then left the hanger. The doors to the hanger closed automatically as he stepped into his new swoop bike and rode to the meeting area. A loud chugging filled the air as Boba raced through Anchorhead. It wasn’t a long ride, but it was an enjoyable one. Boba spent the time thinking about the potential consequences of being caught by the New Republic. It was after a few moments that Boba decided that it wouldn’t be an issue. Bounty Hunters were usually given a lot of privilege when it came to whom they work for. Most people recognize that a Hunter’s values usually just depend on whom is paying them at that moment. Knowing that however, Boba tended to be more discerning than the average hunter; he wouldn’t work with a person unless they shared certain values with Boba. Notably among those values were order and a sense of brutal justice. As to why he had no problem working with the Empire, well, it was the Empire who maintained order while the Rebels introduced chaos. Although, Boba did realize that if the Rebels had actually defeated the Empire, then perhaps there is a new force for order in the galaxy.

With that thought in mind, Boba finally pulled up to the building in question. It was rather plain and unmarked. The reason was probably because the New Republic didn’t want to draw attention for, what sounded like, a dangerous mission. Getting out of the swoop, Boba walked over to the only entrance in sight.

“Hello?” Boba questioned, as he knocked on the door.

A few moments later, a mechanical eye popped out and looked into Boba’s helmet. “Marker?” it asked.

Boba reached for his stolen marker and held it out for the eye. It scanned the marker and then retreated back into its slit. Mirroring that, the door opened wide and Boba walked on through. Inside was a hallway with no rooms on the side. It was very simply adorned, with some carvings in the sandstone every few feet. Eventually, the hallway ended and Boba walked into a room with several other characters also waiting.

“What’s this, a Fett mimic?” a tattooed Zabrak asked. “It’s weakness to base your identity on others.”

Boba sneered under his mask. “Yes well, I am sure that your tattoos make up for you lack of one.”

A pair of Duros sitting in a corner laughed. “That’s right Nomas. I am sure your pain tats make you just as unique as the other billion Zabrak.”

Boba’s turned his attention to the Duros. They seemed like brothers; most bounty hunters don’t get as friendly as those two appeared to be. Both were dressed in fairly heavy durasteel armor and had long rifles on their back. Looking back at the Zabrak, now with the name Nomas, it was quite different. He had light armor on and 4 vibroswords on his back. Bringing his focus back to Nomas’ face, Boba could see the disgust on it; bloodlust almost. But instead of acting, he just sat down and mediated.

“Be mindful of what you say Ozer, Delwol.” A Miraluka female advised.

Like the rest of her species, she also had her eyes covered with a strip of fabric. Beyond that she had a violet clock on with a hood over her head allowing only a few strands of her silver hair to be visible. “Nomas is only just holding back his rage.”

A Rodian decided to speak up. “All Zabrak are like that Ynala.” He snarled. “Just seconds away from falling into a blood rage and hacking everything apart; even their friends or family.” His face turned back to a grin. “And you aren’t impressing anyone by reading him. Everyone knows that Miraluka can read minds.”

The Miraluka named Ynala frowned. “I can’t read minds. I can just sense the emotions their aura gives off, Zalic.” The Rodian Zalic scoffed in response. 

After 30 seconds of these people, Boba was already sick of how they wouldn’t shut up. Boba scanned the rest of the room, to make sure that there were no other surprises though. In a far corner of the room, he saw a heavily hulking, armored Trandoshan who seemed to be staring aggressively. Following his gaze, he saw an equality hulking, but less armored, Wookiee; He was staring back just as hard.

“Ah,” Boba remarked. That explained it; Trandoshans and Wookiees don’t like each other. Probably had to do with how often Trandoshans capture and sell Wookiees to slavers. Boba decided to not bother with them anymore. He found an empty seat, walked over, and sat down. It seemed however, that the Duros decided that Boba was not ready for silence. They both walked up and looked down on him.

“And what is your story,” Ozer asked.

“That’s right. You think you can just walk in and judge us all? Rookie?” Delwol added.

Boba tilted his head back up. Ozer’s durasteel armor was tinted violet. Now that he was standing closer, Boba could see that his long rifle was heavily modified. With a scope on its body, it was clearly designed for extreme sharpshooting. Meanwhile Delwol, in his crimson tinted armor, well his long rifle had the opposite approach. With its many, many heatsinks, it was clearly designed to put a lot of fire downrange; and very quickly too.

“Are all Duros so desperate for attention?” Boba inquired sarcastically. “Or is it just you two?”

“Careful,” Ozer tested. “We are being kind.”

Delwol’s hand shook. “Remember, you may be dressed like Boba Fett, but you aren’t him.” He then scoffed. “Don’t know why you would want to anyway. He always acted so mighty, so much better than us.” His eyes had a gleeful glare. “Didn’t save him from falling into the mouth of that sarlacc though.”

Boba had to fight to stay still upon hearing that. Evidentially, people did hear about what happened to him. Instead of executing the man though, his body just settled with twitching his eyebrows. “Yes, I am very sure you and your brother are both master hunters; Far better than Boba Fett ever was.” Boba paused. “I’m sorry, which one of you is which again? One fish eyed Duros is the same as any other. Boba could immediately tell that they didn’t appreciate being compared to their water-based cousins, the Neimoidians.

Boba quickly stood up and drew his rifle and pistol. Boba’s actions proved apt since at the same time, both Duros returned the favor by drawing their long rifles.

“Well then, are you fishing for a fight?” Boba mocked.

“There are two of us,” Ozer countered.

“And one of you. Consider your place here” Delwol commanded.

“Considered,” Boba retorted. “You need more to make this a fair fight.”

Suddenly, two vibroswords flourished through the space between Boba and the Duros brothers. They were then brought back and held at the ready. “What if I enter the equation?” Nomas the Zabrak asked.

“Not even if the Wookiee entered the fight” Boba replied.

Nomas licked the sword. He seemed to intentionally slit his own tongue to get blood on the blade. “That sounds like a challenge. I like challenges.” He purred.

“It was a fact,” Boba corrected.

The muscles in Nomas’ arms tensed as if he was preparing to strike. Before he could however, Nomas heard a clicking right near his ears. As he pivoted his head to get a better view, his grin grew fiercer. “Rodian... No matter. I have an extra blade for your blood as well.” 

Zalic cycled the heatsink of his blaster and caused steam to waft near Nomas’ face. “If you think you are faster than a blaster bolt, go ahead.” Zalic grinned. “Warning though; you wouldn’t be the first Zabrak to lose that speed test.”

Boba could hear the anger in his voice; he didn’t need to be a Miraluka like Ynala to tell that there was something there. Zalic would get no sympathy from Boba though; everyone has lost someone. With little care, Boba stopped paying attention to the Rodian; he wasn’t the biggest threat in the room. In fact, neither was the Zabrak or the Duros. And with the Miraluka sitting calmly, that left only the Trandoshan and the Wookiee. And from what Boba could tell, both of them were closer to pulling weapons on each other instead of reacting to anything else happening in the room. He refocused on the two Duros in front of him.

“So,” Boba began, “Did you plan out what happens next? Are you prepared to handle the costs?”

The Duros appeared to hesitate for a moment. They clearly didn’t plan on Boba preempting the weapon draw. The Zabrak and Rodian joining in were a surprise as well. However, they seemed to swallow their fear and hold steady. “You seem confident for a newbie...” Ozar began.

“One must wonder if that confidence came before or after getting your Mandalorian wanna-be armor” Delwol ended.

“Do you always finish each other’s thoughts? Or do you only have a single brain to share between the both of you?” Boba replied.

Suddenly, before anyone else could say anything further, Ynala decided to interject. “All of you should stop; while you can still make the choice to do so.”

Speaking for all the of the confused, Nomas asked the question. “And just who will be the one to take away our choice? You?” He assumed. “I certainly would enjoy an extra warm body to fight. I haven’t heard the cries of a Miraluka in a long while.”

Without fear, Ynala calmly answered, “No. Someone powerful and stronger than all of us. He approaches now.”

“What?” Ozer asked.

Suddenly every single person standing felt their body being squeezed. It was as if a giant hand was firmly grasping them with little regard for comfort. They were then all lifted off the ground and brought to chairs before being forcefully seated. While the pressure then receded, Boba found that he still couldn’t stand.

“Yes” Ynala repeated. “Stronger”. All hunters where now sitting next to each other; and all of them were unable to move an inch.

Boba’s eyes narrowed as he ignored the whining of the other hunters. He had seen this type of power before. Anyone who spent any amount of time near Lord Vader would. He darted his focus to all corners of the room; Was there a Jedi here somewhere? He looked at Ynala’s face. It wasn’t fear on her face, but awe. Suddenly from behind, a new voice entered the room.

“Ah, thank you for politely sitting there.” Boba knew for a fact that the speaker had a big fat grin on their face. “Sorry for the wait; Paperwork.”

It was a female’s voice and Boba could swear that he knew it. Unfortunately, he wasn’t sure where his memories ended and the sarlacc’s intrusions begin.

A fair skinned woman walked to a podium in front of the hunters. She was wearing black combat fatigue pants, a tight-fitting tan shirt, and a green combat jacket. Her blonde hair was tied into a loose ponytail falling just below her shoulders. Along with her, came a figure completely cloaked in robes with a face entirely obscured in the shadows of his hood. Boba glanced at Ynala. Even through the hood and eye bandages, Boba could tell what she was focused on: The hooded figure had captured her attention entirely. Before he could think on this however, the women in front of them began talking.

“Hello, I am Commodore Eclipse and on the behalf of the New Republic, I would like to welcome all of you.” She looked as if she was about to continue, but the idiot brothers interrupted her.

“What was that shit?” Ozer yelled.

Eclipse at least tried to be serious. “I have no idea what you are talking about.” She answered.

“Oh come on!” Delwol shouted. “We all were forced to these seats! Now of us could move even a finger!” The brothers looked to the rest of the hunters but none of them voiced any support.

Boba couldn’t attest as to why the rest of them said nothing, but he knew better than to question a force user. He had been around enough people who had made that mistake with Lord Vader. The Duros must have been young enough, or lucky enough, to have never encountered an inquisitor during the height of the Empire.

Eventually, the brothers accepted that no one would join them in questioning. They quieted down quickly enough soon after that.

Now that the interruption was over, and with a smirk on her face, Eclipse continued talking. “Well then. As I said, I am here representing the interests of the New Republic.” She paused to think of her next words. “As you no doubt know, we broke a majority of the Empire near the moon of Endor.”

“And ended my business,” the Trandoshan hissed. The Wookiee growled in disgust. It wasn’t difficult to know what type of business the lizard did.

The commodore glared before continuing. “Yes, well, while the Empire is, without a doubt dead, there are still those who haven’t come to appreciate that fact yet. And if they were to remain unopposed, then they would continue to play out their dramatic acts of terror. The New Republic clearly cannot allow these people to act without impunity. Any member of this ‘Imperial Remnant’ must be hunted down and brought to justice. They could have resigned to their ends peacefully when the Emperor died, but they decided to make the situation difficult.” Eclipse’s gazed across all of the hunters. “The New Republic will respond in kind and without mercy.”

Once Zalic was sure that Eclipse had finished her thought, he had a question. “Well then, what do you need us Bounty Hunters for then?” he asked. 

“Well a job, obviously.” She replied. “We have a task that you all are uniquely specialized for.”

Upon hearing that, Boba glanced across all the other hunters. They all did the same. Think as he might, Boba couldn’t figure out what she was talking about. Well, he could think of one idea, but surely that wasn’t what she wanted.

Nomas had none of Boba’s hesitation however. “I know not what the rest of these bloodless can do, but I know what I can do. And I know this is what I am very very good at. If I am here, there can only be one thing you need. You want Jedi hunters.” He unabashedly claimed.

With a grim look on her face, Eclipse confirmed the situation. “Yes. On paper, you all have the capacity to kill jedi. The Republic recognizes those abilities and would like to use said abilities in a manner aligned with our goals. Our targets is of the Remnant and our target includes dark jedi.” 

Boba exhaled a shallow breath. He had somehow chased nightmare; from the sarlacc to sith lords, it seemed nothing could ever be clean and easy.

“Yes, but why us specifically.” Physically blind to the world, Ynala’s gaze was still fiercely directed to the being in the hood. “Clearly, you have others capable of handling this.”

Eclipse understood to what and to whom she was implicating. “We only have so many people capable of dealing with this. And honestly, they have more important and critical jobs to handle.” She took a moment to glance at her associate before looking back to the group. “Without them, any ‘average’ soldier sent is liable to die.” Her face became certain and firm. “The New Republic will not un-needlingly sacrifice the lives of countless soldiers to gain objectives when there are better options on the table.” Boba felt that she really did believe that too.

“So, you would rather sacrifice us then?” Zalic questioned.

“Surely not,” Eclipse denied. “The New Republic is simply offering you a job. You are Bounty Hunters. If you want to turn it down, then turn it down.”

The beginning of hissing told Boba that the Trandoshan decided to add to the conversation. “Hunting Jedi different game than hunting Fallen. Jedi not end life; Sith do”.

Boba fiercely disagreed with that claim. But he figured that for many, the events of The Clone Wars were long past and long forgotten. 

“Seems to me,” Ozer began, “That you are scared of these dark jedi.” Boba couldn’t tell if he was talking to Eclipse or to the Trandoshan. “If you are so unable to deal with them maybe they aren’t as manageable as you implied. Maybe, our fortunes would be better to align with them instead?” He asked.

Suddenly, the air in the room felt dense. Every hunter was pushed down with a weight that made even breathing difficult. Boba could barely resist falling out of his seat. He could barely even think, focused as he was on not suffocating. Through his diluted and sweaty vision however, Boba saw Eclipse frantically signal to the robed figure. Boba wasn’t sure, but that being might be as strong as Lord Vader; maybe even beyond him.

A frazzled Eclipse apologized and then relaxed her stance. With her now loose posture and arms across her chest, it appeared as if she was reminiscing. “You know, a certain hunter once told me that a bounty hunter picks their clients on the assumption of repeat business. He said that he choose the Empire because the Alliance wasn’t likely to exist long enough to pay beyond his first fee.” Eclipse fixed her posture and looked sure of herself. “Well, the situation has changed.”

Boba paused for a second; That sounded familiar.

“Who told you that? Boba Fett himself.” Delwol mocked.

Eclipse’s eyes burned through Delwol as she replied. “As a matter of fact, yes. He was hired to capture me. He turned me over to Vader himself.”

It was moments like this that Boba appreciated his excellent self-control and willpower. A weaker man would have budged, shifted, or even ran. Boba revealed nothing. He knew who this lady was; Juno Eclipse. That meant, he knew exactly who that cloaked figure was. And with that knowledge, Boba made sure to sit perfectly still. It was good that the attention was not on him at the moment.

With Delwol silenced, Eclipse decided to add to her thought. “Look, side with the Remnant if you want. We will even let you leave here peacefully. But make no mistake, they are the tattered remains of an already broken force. Even if you survive, you won’t get paid.” She looked a little smug now. “Why even bother to waste your time?” No one dared to interrupt her. “Now, who is interested” she asked.

“Well, I don’t need much reason to kill Imperials; much less Sith.” Zalic said. “I am willing to listen more.” 

“I don’t need a reason at all to cleanse my blades in blood,” Nomas added through a fierce beastly smile. Zalic glared at him. Nomas’ smile remained even still.

Boba looked at the Duros Brothers. He assumed that they would have blurted out their approval right away, but they didn’t. He was almost impressed. Eventually, Ozer decided to speak for himself and his brother. “We became bounty hunters for fame and glory. If we ran from this, we would be running from our life’s goal.” He explained. Delwol nodded.

After listening to that, Boba decided to voice his acceptance as well. After all, it wouldn’t be very professional to decline after having his own words spat in his face. “I’m in.” Boba acknowledged. He then looked at Ynala; curious as to what she would do. She appeared to be deep in thought; not that Boba could really tell one way or the other.

Eventually, Ynala made her decision. “I have allowed myself to be guided by the force for my whole life. Today is no different. I have foreseen that I am to go on this mission.”

The Trandoshan looked tense. Boba could see it in his eyes. That lizard had fought both sith and jedi before. He was considering his options. “I slay”. He simply said.

Upon hearing that, Boba recognized that the lizard’s eyes weren’t tense or scared; rather they were focused and excited.

Finally, all eyes turned to the Wookiee. He hadn’t said much throughout this meeting. If you don’t count him growling at the Trandoshan, then he hadn’t said anything at all. To Boba’s surprised however, the furry beast simply got up and left the room.

“I see,” Eclipse said sadly. “Well, we offered the choice.” She waited for the Wookiee to leave before moving on. “Now that you have expressed your interest, I can get into detail of the actual request.”

She clicked a few buttons at the terminal. Suddenly a holographic galaxy map opened up. It began to zoom in until it finally reached the nearby planet of Hypori; nearby when considering a galactic scale anyway. On screen, orbiting the planet, was an Imperial-II class frigate. It was a smaller and less powerful version of the usual Star Destroyer people imagine when thinking of the Empire. But then again, judging from how damaged even this ship appeared, with giant gashes and scores all across the hull, Boba figured that the Remnant were already scraping the bottom of the barrel for ships to use. It still had the familiar wedge shape, but there were multiple craters all over, serving to distort the profile of a once strong ship.

“After the defeat at Endor, all major Imperial holdings and forces were ordered to scatter. Apparently, that order wasn’t just for significant fleets, but also for research and temple ships. This one,” Eclipse pointed at the holographic image,” has ran all the way from Korriban.”

“Why is it here?” Boba asked. “Long way from there.”

“Because we have been chasing them.” Eclipse responded. “We have been trying to capture this ship for a long while now.”

“and why do you need to capture it?” Zalic inquired. “The ship doesn’t look like much”.

“Well truthfully, the ship doesn’t matter; you are right. What we want is in the ship.” Eclipse manipulated her console and caused the map to disappear and a crystalline red pyramid to appear instead. “This is a holocron. It is used to store vast amounts of jedi or sith knowledge and there is one on that ship. By the orders of Grandmaster Skywalker, we were to reclaim it from the Remnant. We tried to take it directly, but for some reason, whenever we engaged them with a large force, every New Republic soldier would…” she paused as if she tried to think of the right words, “lose themselves, I suppose. By the time we could collect ourselves, the sith would escape to live another day. I was told that a force ability called battle mediation was causing the effect. The hope is that with a small strike team, we could bypass it entirely.”

“And how would we get on to the ship?” Ynala asked. “Surely they would be keen to track any invaders.”

“We would fly you into system but stay at a suitable distance away. From there, you would get into an imperial dropship that we captured. You would fly over and enter from one of the many holes.”

“Don’t they have shields? How do you not know we won’t just crash on the surface?” Ozer asked.

“We are sure they will be off. This thing is really heavily damaged. They are more than likely diverting whatever power output to the engines and to the hyperspace drive for a quick getaway. At most, they have a field to keep the air in, but that isn’t enough to stop you.” Eclipse answered.

“What sith be expected?” the Trandoshan hissed.

Eclipse shrugged. “The usual. Leftover stormtroopers mostly. But they aren’t the main issue. Based on our many attempts at taking the ship, we are sure that there are dark jedi on it; more than likely with the job of protecting the holocron. Those are probably to be the major challenge with this job.” She paused before continuing. “That is, unfortunately, all we are sure about. This was a sith ship over Korriban; Weren’t many opportunities to get spies on board.”

“What’s the reward?” Nomas asked.

“100,000 credits. Each. To be delivered immediately upon the delivery of the holocron. Along with that, you all get preferred status with the New Republic for any future jobs.” Eclipse replied. “Any other questions?”

“When do we head out?” Boba asked.

Eclipse smiled. “Immediately.”


	2. Feet First into Terror

\--------------------------------------1 Day Later------------Hypori Space------------------------

‘5 minutes to the frigate,” Zalic told Boba. Zalic was focused on flying the imperial shuttle, and didn’t divert his gaze from the controls.

Standing behind him, Boba nodded as he looked at Zalic’s goggled face. Zalic decided not to wear any heavy armor. Instead, he favored a tan flak jacket with blue accents. Over his shoulder, he had a bandoleer with a plethora of various grenades and two heavy Mandalorian pistols; Boba recognized those. After looking over him, Boba felt like he had to ask. “You sure that trench coat is enough?”

Zalic chuckled. He took one hand off the ship controls and pulled back part of his coat. Underneath, a shield generator was revealed. “Effective against sabers as much as blasters” Zalic assured Boba. He put his jacket back in place and said, “I will be fine. Now go tell the rest of the crew of our ETA.”

“Why not,” Boba muttered.

He left the cockpit of the shuttle that the New Republic so generously donated to the mission. Boba had been in a lot of these Tri-winged T-4a shuttles during his time working for Lord Vader. He had become very comfortable with all the ‘habits’ that came with a ship like this. Despite what it looked like from the outside; it was actually fairly spacious. And as Boba walked through the threshold into the crew quarters, he could see that the rest of the hunters were fully taking advantage of that fact. Boba gazed upon each of them in turn.

The only people sitting near each other were the brothers, Ozer and Delwol. They were wearing the same durasteel armor they had during the meeting at Anchorhead; this time though, they also had full head helmets on as well. They were each busying themselves with tuning and calibrating their guns; Ozer with his sniper, and Delwol with his heavy repeater. With how heavily modified their respective weapons where, Boba had difficulty recognizing the base models. Even if he did, it probably wouldn’t be useful anyway. Considering the many obvious changes, Boba figured that their capabilities varied wildly from their stock cousins. Regardless, both weapons clearly very effective at killing anyone, let alone Jedi. Indeed, Boba figured that even Vader would have to pause for even a moment if he was presented with the amount of laser fire that Delwol’s repeater could no doubt put down field. Although, if Vader were to get close, the situation would no doubt quickly become different; for both Ozer and Delwol. Their weapons were terrible for closer range, and their armor prevented quick movement and fast evasion.

“Well,” Boba figured, “They are still alive; So, they clearly haven’t had many issues.”

Turning his attention to the Trandoshan, Boba had no choice but to be impressed with the reptile’s equipment. His silver tinted armor might be the most thick and comprehensive that Boba had ever seen. It forced Boba to wonder why Bossk didn’t wear armor as massive as that; although looking at the towering statue of a being in front of him, the answer was definitely self-evident. Boba was not a short man. Even then, the Trandoshan towered over him. This lizard’s armor clearly didn’t come at the cost of his weapon either. He was armed with a massive LS-150 Heavy Accelerated Particle Repeater Gun. Frankly, Boba wasn’t even sure if he could hold that massive gun; at least if he wanted to have any accuracy when aiming. Looking at Delwol’s repeater and then at the Trandoshan’s, well it wasn’t even a fair comparison. In fact, unlike Delwol, this gun wouldn’t have an issue with close range combat either. When combining the massive bayonet, currently being sharpened by the lizard, and his armor-enhanced strength, well Boba figured that even this ship’s hull wouldn’t be able to resist many committed blows.

Hearing a sword being sharpened, Boba pivoted towards Nomas. He was currently sharpening one of his many blades. Apparently, Nomas decided that he was committed to carrying around those four vibroswords on his person. Apparently, only having two arms wasn’t enough of a problem to make him re-consider how many blades he should bring. But then again, Boba supposed that it was probably better to have a spare blade and not need it, than not have it and need it. Still, after a certain point, it was overkill and would weight him down. That fact was evident in Nomas’s choice in armor; Zabrak battle armor. It was an expensive piece of mail that was quite difficult to obtain; Well, a fresh new set would have been expensive. The scarred bloody mess currently on Nomas was quite the art piece. Honestly, based on his limited interactions with him, Boba figured that Nomas, more than likely, went out of his way to get the armor as gore ridden as possible; a colorful armor for a colorful man. The shadows of his former battles definitely synergized aesthetically with his many tattoos. Boba could only hope that the vainglorious nature of Nomas’ equipment didn’t end up backfiring during the battle. 

Trapped in his musing, Boba heard a voice from the corner of the hold calling him. He pivoted his head and saw Ynala waving him over. She was wearing a set of light purple armor with a half skirt behind the legs. Boba could vaguely remember seeing vids of warriors from the old republic wearing it; it was called Zeison Sha armor or something like that. Apparently, that particular type of armor was designed to help enhance the focus and empower the mind of its wearer. Boba never believed in that type of stuff to be honest, but he supposed that for a Miraluka, such benefits were easily proven evident. Her weapon of choice was just as interesting as her choice of defense. Tied behind her back, Ynala had one long silver force pike. Boba could remember being on the wrong side of that weapon; its emanated pulse tended to burn itself into your memory. Boba motioned for Ynala to go on.

“How long until we get to the ship?” she asked. “Zalic did tell you, didn’t he?”

Boba cleared his throat before answering. “about 5 minutes. Everyone should make sure that they are geared up and ready for combat.” Boba paused for a moment. “Make sure you are space-ready as well.”

“I have a question too,” Delwol waved his hands in a mocking manner. When the focus of several angry stares were upon him, he pointed to the Trandoshan. He proceeded to ask, “Do you have a name? It’s annoying to call you Trandoshan all the time.”

The lizard stopped sharpening his bayonet for a moment to hiss at Delwol.

“In basic please.” Delwol requested.

The Trandoshan took a moment to consider the question and situation. After a moment, it nodded its head, and hissed out his name. “Harkh”.

Upon hearing the answer Delwol returned to putting on all his gear.

Boba stood in place, expecting a very similar question to be directed towards him. To his surprise however, no one bothered to ask for it.

Evidently, Nomas noticed his shock; what little evidence there was for it anyway. “Confused? No one wants your name Mimic. He who copies another’s identity does not deserve his own.” At this point, Nomas had finished sharpening his swords and began to check the seals on his scarred armor to ensure their safety for space walk. After a click of his helmet he said, “Do something worth a name, and I will ask for a name.”

Upon hearing that, Boba could only laugh. These people asking Boba Fett to do something worth mentioning. With a chuckle, Boba replied with, “I’ll make sure to impress.”

Moments later, Zalic left the cockpit and approached the waiting group of heavily armored bounty hunters. “So, uh, there is something I want to bring up,” he began. “I am sure that you remember how damaged the ship looked when we saw it via wireframe hologram, but, well, it’s easier to show.”

Zalic walked over to an observation port and opened it up. Every hunter followed and looked; Ozer made the Duros equivalent of whistle.

“Is there something special? What do you all see?” Ynala asked.

Boba remembered that Miraluka see through the force. A ship without holes isn’t very different than a ship without holes. He began to voice the observations to let her in on the situation. “The ship is broken. Whatever Eclipse showed us, it was definitely outdated.”

The frigate a short distance ahead of the Hunter’s craft could barely be considered functional. In fact, based on the 4 massive craters in its hull, it might not even reach that low bar. Entire sections of the ship were held together using only ray shielding. Furthermore, half of the frigate’s engine were completely blasted off the engine bay. It would have a difficult time escaping anything.

“Ah, easy prey.” Even with the mask on his head, the bloodthirsty grin on Nomas’s face was obvious to all. “They can’t run and they can’t defend themselves. Perfect.” 

Likewise, Boba was just as sure of the irritated frown that was definitely on Zalic’s face. Zalic decided to speak regardless. “The original plan was to fly this ship into the hanger. But based on how damaged that frigate is, I am sure that anything flying in, especially a ship in a good condition such as ours, will be detected as irregular.” He looked at each of his fellow hunters. “Any idea?”

As the room echoed in silence, Boba remembered something. And this one definitely came from him; unless the sarlacc ate another Mandalorian at some point of course. Boba looked to the rest of them and began to work out his plan. “What are those ray shields actually keeping out? How strong are they?”

Zalic pulled over a monitor and browsed the output for a few seconds before replying, “Basically nothing. The generators are pumping out so little power, that the shields are just barely keeping the air in.”

Boba walked over to his jetpack. He gave it a once-over and quickly tossed it onto his back. After a couple seconds, Boba secured it, walked to the hanger loading door, and looked back at the group. From their stances, Boba could tell that they knew what he was implying, but none of them had bothered making a move just yet.

“Well?” Boba questioned in a gruff voice. “Prepare to board” he demanded.

Boba couldn’t see the faces of most of the hunters, due to their helmets of course, but he was sure that they were grinning. After all, this is where the fun begins. Everyone grabbed a thruster pack and joined Boba at the doors. They all stood behind him and waited.

“After you… Mandalorian.” Nomas mocked.

Boba only nodded his head in response. With his fist, he hit the controls to the loading ramp. And as the ramp slowly lowered, Boba took in the visage of a truly mutilated ship. He turned his head and glanced at the other hunters waiting for him. Seeing that they were all ready for him, he took a step forward and ordered, “Attack!” He immediately ignited his thruster and launched towards one of the frigate’s hangers. The rest soon followed.

Within seconds, Boba was near the entrance to the frigate. Peering into the hanger, he could see hordes of stormtroopers carrying packages and loading their remaining escape ships. Curiously enough, what few guards there where, had their weapons pointed at a door going deeper into the ship and not into space. It made no difference to Boba. He was here for a job; He would get it done.

Before the stormtroopers could recognize the oncoming storm, Boba brought up his rifle and opened fire. Immediately, troopers and equipment started to collapse onto the ground from Boba’s laser storm. Soon, the rest of the hunters followed up as well. Lances of hot plasma flew through the void of space and impacted upon the unprepared stormtroopers. Most died immediately without knowledge of what was happening. A few could see the rain of heat but couldn’t react quick enough. Less still were able to evade the blasts and hide behind whatever cover they could find. They attempted to return fire, but their shots went wide partly due to their panic and party due to skillful evasion. Boba could recognize that their mental state must have been loose even before the firefight began; else this would have been far more difficult.

But it wasn’t.

Soon, the last body fell to the ground as a smoking corpse; Every single holdout was slain mercilessly. The hanger, already in a poor state before the fight, looked even worse now. Very few fortunate spots remained unmarked from laser scoring. And not a single bounty hunter was injured or had anything close to damage upon their body armor.

Zalic holstered his pistols and walked among the dead. He bent down and inspected the boxes and their contents. “These are rations.” He looked towards the few transports; now all burned from the laser fire. “Were they trying to run?”

Ozer and Delwol, slowly approaching and covering each other, walked up the ramp of one of the transports. Edging in slowly, they attempted to confirm or deny Zalic’s theory. Looking in, they could see dozens of similar boxes. Upon confirming no survivors hiding, they lowered their guns and opened up a box each; One brother found food, the other brother found spare parts. Ozer walked back out of the transport, chewing on a ration, and confirmed Zalic’s suspicions. “Well, if they weren’t trying to run, they certainly had these things ready for a quick escape.”

“Let them run,” Nomas grinned. “They will only succeed in dying tired.”

Harkh walked from trooper to trooper and unmasked them. Boba could see his attention jump from trooper to trooper as he could clearly sense something… different. “Something wrong,” Harkh hissed. “Something not clean. These meatbags covered in scars and taint.” Harkh stood back up and picked up one of the unmasked troopers to show what he was talking about.

The formerly alive human’s visage reflected the frigate he rode in well. His face was scarred and covered in pox and gashes. Every piece of flesh was lacerated or scared or cursed. Indeed, looking at the human as a whole, Boba got some very uneasy feelings from it. Feelings that brought up some very unfortunate memories when witnessed people get on the bad side of Lord Vader. With that in mind, he looked towards the only hunter who had any similar capacity to the former lord of the empire. Ynala looked like she could barely stand. Wavering back and forth, it appeared to Boba that it took every last bit of strength for Ynala to not collapse onto the burned ground.

Suddenly, laughter echoed in Boba’s ears. He turned his head to the source and saw Delwol leaving the loaded escape ship. “It looks to me,” he began, “like these guys were having a bad day.”

“Tough,” Boba replied. “Their day is about to get worse.” He walked over to Ynala and gave a supporting hand to steady her. “Do you see anything?” he asked.

Ynala stopped shaking and attempted to speak. She quickly ceased however, clearly having to suppress the urge to vomit. Eventually, she got past it and began to talk. “I know where the holocron is.” She slowly raised a hand and pointed deeper into the ship. “All this chaos is pulsating off it and growing deeper into the ship like a cancer.” She then looked at the trooper that was still being held by Harkh. “Don’t eat that. Its sick from the radiation.” She paused. “Although, that man probably had more inflicted upon him. Something worse happened to him. Something worse happened to this ship.”

Boba was still looking in the direction that Ynala had pointed. Browsing along the great wall, he saw one exit out of the hanger and deeper into the ship. “No coincidence that it was the same door that the troopers were guarding at gun point before we came,” Boba muttered to himself. “Oh well.” Boba gathered the attention of everyone. “We are here to do a job. Let’s get to work. No matter what this,” Boba paused as he thought of a word to use, “plague is, we have a contract to fulfill.”

Harkh growled as he dropped the stormtrooper corpse and walked towards the door. Ozer and Delwol followed closely behind. Zalic walked up to Boba, and an almost recovered Ynala, and nodded at them. He drew his pistols as Ynala took out her force pike and engaged it, electricity arcing through the air. They both left and joined Harkh in covering the door for an entry maneuver. Seeing them ready, Boba only had one more thing to add, “Leave no survivors. Allow no one to continue unmolested.”

Everyone prepared themselves near the door. Taking point, Zalic walked forward and undid the lock; a trivial matter since it was sealed on his side. Slowly, the large hanger doors groaned open which allowed the hunters to peer deeper into the ship. The primary lighting seemed to no longer be operating as the hallway was tinted in the red of the emergency floor guides. Seeing no obviously threats hiding in the limited area, the hunters, led by Zalic and Harkh, walked in. This hallway was clearly only a connection threshold between the hanger and the core of the frigate. There were two doors, the one they came in through and the one at the end of a long walk.

Boba had been in a lot of ships before. None of them ever sounded, or felt, quite like this frigate did. Quiet wasn’t quite the right way to describe the feeling that fell down upon him and his allies. The better way to say it, would have been that the ship was heavy with silence. An aura that felt as a predator stalking its prey. Out of the corner of his eye, Boba could in fact see that the tone was starting to affect the rest of the crew. Ozer and Delwol were getting really twitchy. Despite being in a one-way hallway, their guns shifted position near every second. Ynala was still combating what, Boba assumed, was blight radiating from the holocron. Zalic tried to reveal nothing, but Boba could tell that his enthusiasm to lead the group through the ship implied something of his mind state; He clearly wanted to rush this mission and be out as soon as possible. The giant lizard next to him, was taking very large, deliberate steps, as if he were a rival animal challenging the alpha of the pack. And Nomas, well Nomas seemed completely the same as he always was. Boba figured, considering his prior interactions with him, Nomas’ personality, more than likely, seemed right at home in this sort of malevolent atmosphere. If anything, it seemed to be provoking him further, based on how actively he was flourishing his twin vibroswords.

Boba stopped his gazing eyes once the group finally got to the end of the hallway. With everyone taking their positions by the door, Zalic, once again, took point and opened it. However, unlike before, the slowly opening bulkhead revealed a scene quite different than what anyone was expecting.

The first thing that impacted upon the hunters was the smell. Even before the doors were fully opened, a putrid wall of filth smashed into them; the hunters’ helmets only barely able to suppress its infiltration. Coughing and faltering, the hunters struggled a second to rebalance themselves and regain their posture. They had a better idea of what the stormtroopers from earlier were running from now. Indeed, this also assisted in explaining why they were so shaken; normal stormtroopers would have put up a much better fight instead of simply falling apart.

The physical state of the stormtroopers was still a question though. And after he finally collected himself, what Boba saw beyond the bulkhead into the main chamber of the frigate, only yielded more questions. From the walls, to the floors, to most surfaces in the hall, everything was … unclean; Gore and carnage coated everything.

“What…” Ozer stuttered. “What the fuck happened here.” He was normally so brash. But with all the carnage before him, he could barely voice anything.

There were deceased stormtroopers everywhere. And as the Bounty Hunters walked forward to investigate, it was very clear that something had gone horribly wrong here. In attempt to figure out what that ‘something’ was, the hunters walked to some of the deceased troopers. Some, it seemed were at least lucky enough to die quickly. Their heads or necks fractured upon impact after being tossed aside. Others… well, others seemed to die more painful deaths. Some had limbs ripped off. Some had terrible burns. Some had giant lacerations. Some had huge chunks of fresh ripped away. Many had multiple combinations of such things done to them and more.

Delwol bent down to one of the stormtroopers and took off the white helmet. “Oh shit,” he voiced. “This fucker did not go out well.” Boba glanced at the trooper that Delwol was standing over. The trooper was missing all limbs and had a giant cavity ripped out of his chest. Based on his revealed face, he died in a lot of pain.

“Don’t feel bad for him” Zalic interjected. “Don’t feel bad for any of them.” He looked at the few living people in the room. “Remember, these bastards were empire. Considering all sins committed, truthfully, I think these men still haven’t been punished enough.”

“I wish I could have been the one to slay all them,” Nomas muttered.

“Interesting smell, this one.” Harkh sputtered. He kneeled down near a body that looked very different than any of the stormtroopers. “Not human. Think not a beast either.” He lowered his head and took a great sniff with his nose. “Smells wrong. Not natural.”

“Hey Hey,” Ozer yelled. “Don’t fucking eat it. Put your tongue back in your mouth.” A dejected Harkh stood back up and walked away with a serpentine huff.

Curious, Boba walked over to where Harkh was once standing. He looked upon the beast at the ground, but before he was consciously aware of what he was looking at, his head began to pound. Heavier and heavier, he could barely think; he could barely stand. He fell to the ground, catching himself with his hands just before his head smashed upon the cold steel of the deck. Resisting the urge to vomit, his eyes slowly went white as he remembered… something. In his mind’s eye, he could just barely see a being of a crimson-hue. It was a predatory face he saw, one with bony spur protrusions and a pair of tendrils dropping a short distance from the cheeks. Then came a great heat. And with that great heat, came pain; he remembered a great electrifying pain. Suddenly, he felt something shaking him.

“Are you okay?” Zalic asked. “Don’t break down on me.”

Boba’s eyes finally refocused and he stopped shaking. With an unconscious fidget of his head, he looked at Zalic and could only respond with, “What?”

“Get yourself together!” Zalic ordered. “You and Ynala are the only other rational ones here.” Both Zalic and Boba glanced at Ynala to see her standing completely still, transfixed upon the great set of doors leading to the front of the ship. “And she is having enough trouble as it is.” Zalic added.

Boba could only nod in response. Frankly, he was disgusted in himself; he was usually much stronger than this. His time in the sarlacc must have affected him much, much more than he had thought. “Whose memories were those?” he muttered under his breathe. “What was I seeing?” He slowly took his weight off his hands as he balanced on the soles of his feet. Surprisingly, he could still feel the ghost of the electrifying pain throughout his body. Committed to move on though, Boba banished the pain from his mind. He picked up his fallen rifle and stood up. With some hesitation, he turned his head back towards the beast on the ground. Luckily, he didn’t lose his mind this time. On the ground, was a dead green bipedal predatory creature. It had 4 small forelimbs distributed on its chest and two tentacles extruding directly from its jaw. Furthermore, based on how much blaster impact scoring was distributed on it, likely a very tough hide as well.

Zalic gestured at the blood coating the creature. “Do you think this was the thing that did all this damage?” He took a moment to look around the room. “Was this what the troopers in the hanger were running from?”

Boba took out a small blade and attempted to piece the flesh of the dead beast. With great effort, Boba was slowly able to stab through its hide. “Maybe,” he answered. “But this one is dead. They wouldn’t still be running if it was just this one.” He returned the knife to his belt and walked over to Ynala. “Do you see the holocron?” Ynala didn’t respond. She didn’t even seem aware of his presence. Boba placed a hand upon her shoulder to more directly capture her attention.

With a startle and a shake, Ynala yelped. She looked to the hand on her shoulder and cleared her throat. “Ah, yes. Yes.” She paused again.

Boba frowned. “Ynala. Do you see the holocron?” he asked again, more firmly this time.

She had an uneasy and hesitant stance; shifting the weight of her body from leg to leg with uncertainty. “Well,” she began, “I can’t see that. But I can see the radiation of the dark side pulsing towards us.” She pointed at the great doors. “Its through there.” There was an audible shallow. “Frankly, it’s a little overwhelming.” 

Boba looked to the Duros Brothers. “Check it out,” he signaled. 

“You don’t order me!” Delwol sneered. “Where do you get off giving commands.”

Boba took a moment. “Are you … are you really doing this now?” Boba asked.

Ozer sighed. “Let’s go brother.” He walked towards the door. After a few seconds of resistance, Delwol followed obediently.

With that dealt with, Boba looked over to Nomas. He was currently walking from corpse to corpse, stabbing each of them with the tip of his blades. “I don’t think you need to check if the limbless meat sacks are still alive Nomas,” Boba mocked.

Nomas paused in the middle of stabbing a stormtrooper. “Oh, don’t worry about it.” He replied. Nomas made a show of aggressively slashing his blade through what was left of the corpse “I am doing this for me.” He continued walking from body to body. Interestingly enough, when Nomas started slashing the fallen beast, his blades cut at its hide much easier than when Boba tried with his knife.

“Bad news,” Ozer’s voice brought Boba’s attention back towards the path forward. Ozer was standing with his brother investigating the door and its local control panel. “The door is locked down. And whomever locked this bulkhead down really didn’t want it opening again.”

“Certainly not from here anyway.” Delwol added. “The door panel was overridden by another controller.”

“Is there nothing you could do?” Zalic asked.

Before either of the Duros could answer however, Harkh interjected. “Who needs a door? I make door.” He showed off the massive bayonet at the end of his cannon and walked towards the bulkhead.

Just as he was about slam the blade into the steel, however, Ynala suddenly called out, “Wait. No.” Harkh stopped but held firm, waiting for an explanation. “Look around us. Grasp the situation we are in.” She walked over to Harkh. “I have no doubt that you could break through that wall, but it would be too loud and take too long.” Ynala looked towards the rest of the hunters. “I say we find an alternative way inside. One that is more…quiet”.

The rest of the hunters looked at each other. “Ozer, do you know where else we could undo the lock?” Zalic asked.

“Probably the command deck, I figure,” Ozer shrugged.

“We aren’t sure where that would be though.” Delwol added.

Boba pointed towards a much smaller, less grand set of doors on the opposite side of the room. “That way. Through the barracks, and up the stairs.”

Nomas tilted his head. “And how do you know that?”

“Experience.” Boba replied. No voiced any further questions.

Zalic chuckled. “Fair enough.” He began to walk to the new exit. “Let’s head out.”

The rest of the Hunters followed him. Ynala took one more, long look towards the large bulkhead gates before turning her head around and following as well.

Boba hung back near her. “Are you going to be a problem?”

His answer was a dry laugh. “Imagine if someone made it so that your visor blocked out 50% of all your available vision. And now imagine that you are constantly being pelted with whispers of fear… that is what I am dealing with at the moment.” She started walking slowly. “You will have to forgive me if I am having trouble dealing with it.”

“No.” Boba responded. “I actually don’t.” Before she could say anything, Boba turned around and began to walk towards the door that Zalic was already inspecting. And then Boba sped up when he saw Zalic opening it.

The door slid wide open. Zalic peered through just as Boba got to him. “Seems clear,” Zalic updated the crew. “A lot of staked shelves and chairs on the other side.” He walked in.

Harkh followed. “Last stand. Actions of prey.” He commented.

As Boba approached the doorway and glanced down the hall himself, his eyes widened. “Actions of a trap!” he yelled. “Move”. He pivoted back behind the door frame. 

At Boba’s declaration, a fireteam of stormtroopers rose from their position behind the impromptu cover. With the precise aim stormtroopers were known for, they all targeted Zalic. His personal shield immediately activated, and to its credit, resisted the white-hot blasts, for a moment. But eventually, the shield began to flare, from green to red to nothing. With a proclamation of, “Fuck,” Zalic’s body soon became burned beyond recognition as he fell to the ground; lifeless. Harkh, was sprayed as well, but his heavy armor resisted the bolt impacts well enough to get out of the line of the fire and into cover; okay, but singed.

“SHIT!” Ozer yelled. “Return fire!” He began to shoot with his long rifle, but was unable to have enough time to properly aim. As a result, He, along with his brother who followed along, began to blind fire from around the corner.

Boba, meanwhile, edged right up to the corner. “Keep firing, draw their attention.” He ordered the Duros.

“I am so confused as to what I was doing up to this point.” Delwol mocked as he maintained his fire.

With a smirk on his face, Boba slowly leaned his head to peek beyond the threshold. With his head exposed for only a moment, Boba quickly got the lay of the land, before any trooper could redirect their fire towards him. “5 on the left, 3 in the middle, 1 on the right.” He updated. “All armed with the standard E-11s.” He looked towards Harkh. He was slightly burned, sure, but he was more or less fine. “You can take the fire. Move in.”

Harkh growled in response. “And you?”.

Boba hefted his grenade launcher. “Siegebreaker,” He answered. “Now make sure to favor the right so I don’t hit you.”

With a growl, Harkh backed up a moment. After a second of thought, he picked up the dead green beast off the ground and held it in front of himself. And then he charged.

Boba expected a few things to happen as Harkh ran. He was not expecting the stormtrooper’s shots to get sloppy as they screamed in terror in response to the remains of the beast. The few soldiers who didn’t lose their nerve, immediately diverted all their fire from the hunters to the beast; they didn’t even try to hit Harkh.

“Uh,” Ozer said.

“Ya,” Delwol added.

“Focus,” Boba chastised bringing up his now loaded launcher. “You will soon have clean shots,” he added.

As he turned the corner, he was not met with a single bolt heading his way. Every single iota of attention was dedicated to the remains of that tentacled beast. “Well, I guess I can’t judge them.” He laughed. With a click of a finger, Boba sent several concussive grenades between the left and middle groups of stormtrooper. The shockwave from the blast was not only enough to destroy the cover, but also launched the panicked soldiers onto their asses.

“FIRE!” Boba screamed.

Boba, Ozer, and Delwol all ran, cavalierly through the doorway, guns aiming downrange and unleashed a wall of plasma at the fallen troopers. Their armor, clearly poorly maintained, succumbed to fire. The troopers died soon after; except one. One trooper was lucky enough to be on his lonesome towards the right. At least until Harkh noticed that only a single trooper remained alive. With rage, he tossed the corpse aside and charged the last living trooper. With fear, he screamed, but was unable to bring himself to fire.

“Fuck, don’t kill him!” Boba yelled.

But it was too late. Harkh grabbed the trooper and raised him off the ground. And with a prodigious bite of his jaws, proceeded to part the trooper’s head from his body.

“You stupid lizard.” Boba said. “Now we can’t question anyone.” He paused as Nomas and Ynala joined the group. “How do we figure out what happened now.”

Harkh growled as his response; mouth still busy chewing the recently acquired human head.

“And what do you want to find out?” Nomas laughed. “We have already committed to killing everyone we encounter on this ship. What does it matter if we find out the reason for their fear?” He pointed at the scored corpse on the floor; Although interestingly enough, few bolts, if any, pieced its hide. “Its clearly that anyway. Who cares for the reason why?” He gestured to the dead bodies. “They don’t anymore.”

“If no one minds,” Delwol’s voice garnered attention. “I am taking Zalic’s equipment.”

The rest of the hunters looked at each other. Ynala stood as if she wanted to say something, but she remained mute. Boba decided to reply instead. “Do as you wish.” He turned back towards Harkh and began to walking through the hallway. “Let’s continue.” In the corner of his ears, Boba heard Ozer demanding that Delwol share the scavenged goods. Boba sighed; “Amateurs,” He muttered under his breath.

All 5 bounty hunters made their way through into the next part of the frigate. Technically, this area of the ship was, in fact, much cleaner than the central hub they had just left. Although, considering that the last room was literally covered in viscera and gore, it might not be the best baseline to use. Still, Boba was just glad that this mission didn’t decide to top itself just yet in terms of new experiences and environments. He had witnessed Lord Vader in his rage slaughter hundreds, but … never to this level of carnage. Vader had an air of cold professionalism about him; he did what he did because it was his job; no other reason required. Whatever caused the events in this frigate though, it screams of immaturity; either someone lost control, or lost their will. As far as Boba cared, it made no difference. He was here for a job as well, and he would see it done in a manner fitting of his reputation.

Still, this hallway still did have a story to tell. And while this story wasn’t as…vile as the other room, the Bounty Hunters did find things worth noting; things that at least hinted towards what happened in the other area. 

“So, I guess this was the barrack you mentioned?” Delwol nodded towards Boba. He walked down the hallway and gazed upon each of the rooms off to the side. “Pretty shitty privacy, if you ask me.”

“Naval vessel,” Boba replied. “You take what you can get.”

Ozer walked into a few of the rooms. “Well, it looks like some of these people where taken.” Many of the rooms were in a turbulent state. The beds were destroyed, all sorts of cabinets and shelfs were overturned, and the floors were littered with trash.

Harkh raised his head and flared his nostrils as he smelled the pressurized air. “Killed as well.” He hissed. “Smell blood and urine.” He pointed to a few of the rooms and gestured to the floors near the exits. “See blood trails.”

“Did they drag their own people out of their beds?” Ynala inquired.

Boba’s eyes narrowed. The tone in Ynala’s voice, it wasn’t fear or disappointment; it was curiosity. Not what at all what Boba expected coming from her. He gestured towards the trail of garbage that was swept aside by something, a body more than likely. “Seems so.” He confirmed. “Maybe someone else got here before use.”

“Wait,” Delwol who was now exploring the rooms at the end of the hallway. “These rooms are different.”

The rest of the hunters had joined him and looked into these last few rooms as well. Looking in, they could see that they were far less messy. Instead of all the overturned garbage, as was the case in the other rooms, most simply had messy sheets and unmade beds.

Ozer pondered the rooms. “Maybe these men stationed here heard the ruckus down the hall. They rapidly deployed themselves and attempted to defend their lives.”

Harkh smelled the air again. He pointed to more blood on the floor. “Failed defence.” He corrected.

“Well, that beast we found,” Ynala carefully gestured to the discarded, charred beast on the floor, “Was more or less immune to blaster fire.” She put her hand to her armored chin and thought out loud. “If these soldiers were assailed by a beast such as that, its no wonder they fell.” 

“But that leads to a question.” He gazed towards the makeshift fortifications. “If all these stormtroopers were disposed of, who was firing upon us?” 

Boba led the group to the end of the hallway. After climbing through the hole caused by his grenades, he bent down and inspected deceased bodies; or what was left of them anyway. In his time working with Lord Vader, Boba had come across large amounts of stormtroopers of every role. Using the armor type, weapons, and serial numbers, it took Boba but a few moments to identify them. “These were engineers.” He informed the group. “Likely in charge of engines or generators.” He shrugged. “Maybe both.”

“Why weren’t they dead as well?” Delwol asked.

Now that they were past the barricade, they could see a metaphorical fork in their path. There was another set of doors in the back of the hallway, and a set of stairs leading to another floor.

“How would I know,” Boba shrugged. He pointed to the doors, “Those lead to engine rooms,” and then he pointed to the stairs, “Those lead to the command room. That is our destination.”

Ynala looked thoughtfully at the great engine room doors. “Either, whomever attacked the ship couldn’t get past the door to the engines,” she paused to take a breath, “or the workers keeping the ship moving, where purposely left alive.”

Harkh decided to walk up to the doors leading to the engines and he began to smell it. After a few moments of very thorough sniffing, he began to summarize, “No blasters, no blood, no beasts.”

“So what? The boarders decided that the engineers should be considered non-combatants?” Delwol looked to his brother. “Did they find this door and decide to skip it?”

“No,” Ozer answered. “There was a reason.” He gestured back to the carnage. “You don’t do sort of massacre with the intent to be merciful.”

“Careful, you are jumping to conclusions,” Ynala interrupted. “You are right, the massacre in the prior room does imply truly something terrible.” She looked at the dead stormtroopers. “However, I refuse to believe that it was random chance that lead to these men being left alive after the initial purge. No, there had to be a reason.” She began to count possibilities on her figures. “First possibility is that the invaders, invaders before us mind you, came onto the ship with that blight and it just didn’t reach the engineers in time.” She negatively shook her head. “No, there wouldn’t be troopers escaping after the invasion in that case. They would have all been slaughtered.” She sighed. “I think the empire did this to their own.”

“What?” Delwol asked.

“Think about it. Remember, we are here to reclaim a holocron. Assume that holocron has powerful dark side knowledge on it. Wanting to test it, they used their own people. However, they were still being chased by the New Republic, so they couldn’t kill the engineers keeping what remains of this ship from working.” She paused in a moment of consideration. “Its also possible that due to being so relentless hounded by the New Republic, they felt like they had no other choice but to act so very desperately.”

“Does any of this matter?” Boba interjected in an annoyed tone. The rest of the hunters, so engrossed in their thoughts, they had not noticed that Boba had already started to climb the stairs to get to the command deck. “I am sure each of you are enjoying playing inquisitor, but thinking about the reasons why someone survived or died matters very little. Nor does figuring out the causes for either option.” He looked at Ynala. “I am sure you are very curious as to what is on the holocron now.” Boba paused. “Great. Get moving and let’s reclaim it faster so that you can find out in person.”

Boba heard each of them deeply exhale. They acted as if the wind was knocked out of their sails. Boba had a reason for pushing them forward though. He had seen it when around Vader before. Dwelling upon thoughts of dark magic and terror rarely did good to one’s psyche. Figuring out what truly happened, whether these imperials were hunted or sacrificed, well that answer might do more harm than good. For better or for worse, these were the hunters Boba was with on this mission, and he had already lost one; this question was better unanswered.

With the discussion over, Boba turned around and continued his walk upstairs. He didn’t need to check to see if anyone was still following.

Within a few moments of walking, the next floor was finally reached. There was no door this time, and the hunters simply walked into the command area. There were computers and terminals everywhere along two major axis and leading up to a larger central computer; likely the commander’s station. There were no bodies here. No signs of life. Nothing. Whoever had sealed the doors below, had done their job and then left.

“No power. All dead.” Ozer said as he walked along the left row of monitors.

“Here too,” Delwol added. He slowly walked by each of the machines, clicking buttons as he went. Nothing responded to his touch.

“Don’t need them.” Boba affirmed the brothers. He pointed to the captain’s terminal. “Only that one is necessary.”

“Curious” Harkh said.

Having separated to explore the command deck, each of the hunters slowly approached the captain’s station from their various corners.

“The ship was running on bare power. The engines and the ray shielding were the priorities. The captains command station would have been third on that list. Anything beyond that would have been extra.” Boba turned around to gaze at the rows of computers. “Anything,” He repeated. He faced the only powered system again. “Finally, we are a step closer.”

“Wait,” Ozer meekly said.

Boba kept his body where it was, but merely tilted his head a degree. “What?” he asked annoyed.

“I am just thinking about this…” Ozer began. Looking back to his brother, he began speaking again, “Are we really needed here?” he asked. “I mean, we have confirmed that this ship isn’t going anyway.”

Boba noticed that Ozer was having trouble keeping his hands still, but he said nothing; content to wait until Ozer was done speaking.

“The majority of the flight crew are dead or dying. We could leave and update the New Republic. They can deal with this mess.” Ozer continued.

“Ozer!” Delwol exclaimed. He said nothing further though. It seemed like he was lost for words.

Boba was about to start talking, but, to his surprise, Ynala began first. 

“We wouldn’t be able to confirm any of that.” She began. “Would you be able to personally guarantee that the ship is staying here? Or that whatever Imperials are still here won’t abandon ship with all the dark knowledge they collected? Would you be willing to tell the new force of the galaxy that you let the holocron out of your grasp when it was this close?” She asked rapid fire.

Boba looked curiously at her for a moment, almost forgetting himself. He recollected himself, and asked, “Any other issues?” No one said anything; even Ozer who nervously played with his hands. “Great.” He manipulated the controls on the terminal. Once he got to the final confirmation, he voiced, “Be ready.” He clicked the final commands to unlock everything.

They heard a great smash as vibrations echoed through the ship. Then, they heard roaring.


	3. The Holocron's Monsters

Ozer looked as if he was about to say something, but Boba yelled commands out first. “Take Cover!” He screamed. “Ready your weapons.”

Everyone headed to whatever was closest and not already occupied. They all aimed their weapons at the gateway that served as the command deck’s only entrance… and exit.

They waited as the roaring got louder and louder. However, suddenly, just as the creaking began escalating, all the sounds quickly cut off.

“Where did it go?” Ozer asked. “What happened?”

“Quiet.” Boba chided. “Focus.”

What once was the gentle background noise of the power generators was now heavy upon the shoulders of the hunters. Curious how even the simplest sounds can resonate in one’s mind during moments of terror.

Now of course, Boba was no stranger to these ‘difficult’ situations. Indeed, in moments of the past, he instigated them to others just as much as others returned the favor. However, in this moment, he wasn’t alone and wasn’t depending solely on his own nerve. In this situation, he had others with him; and others means more guns that can misfire and cause collateral damage.

“There is one way here,” Boba spoke softly. “Don’t pay attention to anything else. Everyone you know, everyone you trust, is right here near you.” He paused not just for Ozer, but for the rest of group to absorb what he said. “The moment something appears through that doorway, hit it; with lasers, with grenades, with insults, I don’t care.” He pointed at the threshold into the command deck. “Whatever you do, make sure it hurts. Make sure that nothing gets through that door without injury.”

Boba stopped talking and was met with laughter. “Good speech. Did you practice that earlier or just come up with it now?” Nomas chuckled.

Boba said nothing. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure which memories were coming from where anymore. Hopefully, his mind settles; if he survives of course.

Regardless, whether or not his speech was his own, or from the mind of a soul long lost to the sarlacc, it had the effect Boba wanted. Everyone’s nerves have been steeled and Boba no longer had to worry about a blaster misfiring into his back.

Resolved, they waited; arms at the ready.

Boba took out his grenade launcher and duel wielded it with his rifle. Nomas and Ynala had their melee weapons out, unsure as to their roles in this engagement. Actually, Boba considered again, and decided that Nomas definitely knew what he would do; charge relentlessly. Harkh, well, Boba had no idea what that lizard would do; both shooting and eating are equally possible outcomes.

Regardless, while Boba’s mind wandered, he quickly had his attention refocused by his helmet’s sensors. “Footsteps coming.” Boba warned the crew. They all nodded in affirmation.

Slowly, a giant creature walked up the stairs. As the shadows slowly dissipated, and revealed the creature’s full form, Boba recognized it as kin to the corpse they found earlier. Except, now, it was moving in its full glory. Truly, it was much more menacing in movement; its long tentacles undulating near its gaping maw of rows upon rows of long teeth. Seeing this beast now, Boba could understand slightly more why those engineers panicked so fiercely at the thought of a deceased one rising again.

But then… but then, Boba saw more. Three more of these menacing beasts slowly edged up behind the primary. “Fuck,” Boba whispered under his breathe. One beast, he was sure could be tolerated by his crew’s psyche, more… that was less possible.

Almost immediately, confirming his fear, Boba heard a cry of panic. Boba had heard the voice recently enough to know who it was without even looking. Ozer and Delwol both cried out as they threw grenades at the quartet of monsters. To the shock of Boba and everyone else there, the prehensile tentacles of the beasts caught the pair of grenades and threw them back.

“SCATTER!” Boba yelled. Every hunter jumped away from their cover as the grenades caused a shower of computer fragments to rain down on the command deck. And then, with speed surprising considering their bipedal stature, the green monsters charged forward. Each one picked their own target and each one had their mouths gaping, and tentacles grasping.

“AAAHHHH!” Nomas yelled as he charged one of the monsters. He had a blade in each hand and clearly felt that the fight was fair. And indeed, out of the corner of Boba’s eyes, it seemed like Nomas’ assumption wasn’t too far off the mark. He was actually fast enough to parry all the tentacles stabbing forward. He was even scoring hits of his own upon the beast; much like when he slashed the corpse, Nomas didn’t seem to have a problem slashing through the tough hide. To Boba’s eye, the beast was just as surprised as Boba was when he first saw Nomas do it with the corpse.

Similarly, Harkh slowly marched towards a beast as well. His repeater began to rotate until it slowly got up to speed. Once it got to max rotation, it unloaded a wall of hot lances into the monster. Boba wasn’t sure if it was doing any actual damage, but the mass of each hit was actually enough to stop the monster from moving forward. Boba decided that Harkh would kill his reptile challenger given enough time.

Focusing back to the beast that decided to charge him, Boba activated his jetpack to create some distance. It roared in an animalistic rage as Boba evaded its charging bite. He unloaded on it with both his weapons; Blaster fire and concussive grenades impacted on its tough hide. Unfortunately, as far as Boba could tell, it was all without effect to the beast. Instead, the beast only got angrier and more furious. It sped up to chase after Boba, hopping as it went in an attempt to bring Boba down from the sky.

Gritting his teeth, Boba engaged his jetpack for more rapid movement. He juked to the right to get the Beast turned that way and then quickly juked backed to the left. Before the beast could re-orient himself, Boba shoot out his grappling hook towards the dense legs of the green monster. With its legs tangled up, the beast soon fell over. Boba flew close by, and before any tentacles could pull him down, and fired directly into the beast’s open mouth. This time, Boba got the reaction he wanted. It screeched in pain as its insides were ravaged by Boba’s weapon spray.

Boba made sure to keep shooting even after the beast stopped struggling; committed to ensure no surprises. In fact, it was not his satisfaction that caused him to cease firing, but instead hearing a voice scream to the side. He expected it to be Nomas, but to his surprise, it wasn’t. Ceasing his constant fire Boba turned to the screaming.

“Oh fuck!” Ozer yelled. He panicked as the beast charged him. Discarding his sniper as useless in close range, he turned and ran.

Boba tried to rush over to aid him. While running, he turned to also check on Nomas. Evidently, a monster has no reason to be scared of other monsters. Nomas had skillfully slashed through the monster’s tendons and caused it to collapse helplessly onto the floor. Unable to move or react, the monster simply had to resist Nomas’ endless sword attacks; a feat it was doing unsuccessfully.

Satisfied with that side of the fight, Boba refocused back to Ozer just in time to see him trip and fall. Just as the beast approached Ozer, laser fire impacted over its right eye. Its attention turned to the source of the fire, Delwol, and decided to charge him instead. Meanwhile, Boba witnessed Ynala bend down and help pull Ozer up.

Unfortunately, as Boba could easily tell, Delwol’s gun was nowhere nearly as powerful as Harkh’s was. The beast was able to resist the blows with little issue and continue to march forward. At this point, Boba finally got into range and started firing himself. But it was no help; the beast had decided its target. 

Boba watched as the beast got closer and closer to Delwol. And by the time Delwol noticed that his fire was having no effect, it was to late. The tentacles on the beast’s body shot out and grabbed onto Delwol’s limbs.

“No!” The panic on Delwol’s face was clear. His hands fumbled in terror and dropped the gun. His hands immediately jumped to the tentacles in a vain attempt to pry them off his body.

It was all for naught. Everyone who could watch, witnessed as Delwol was slowly forced into the beast’s mouth and shallowed whole; even including the last yelp for help.

“Get off me!” Ozer yelled as he shook off Ynala’s grasp on him. Ozer looked for his abandoned long rifle. Seeing that it was too far out of his grasp, he grabbed one of the grenades he stripped from Zalic’s corpse. Before anyone could react, Ozer charged right into the animal that devoured his brother. While the beast was still focused on eating Delwol, its tentacles unconsciously shot out, once again, and brought Ozer in close.

“Die!” Ozer yelled.

Just as Ozer was being brought into the beast’s mouth, he activated the grenade. That singular grenade’s explosion caused a chain reaction with all the other grenades along Ozer’s belt.

The Beast exploded in a shower of gore. Boba and Ynala stood there in shock; offal and blood raining upon them. Suddenly, clapping captured Boba’s attention. He turned towards the source. There was Nomas, sitting cross-legged on top of the beast he killed singlehandedly. To Boba’s eye, it appears as if it took a lot of slashes to finally beat the beast down; or maybe Nomas is just as malicious to non-sapient beings as he is to sapients. Either way, Boba could see why he carried around 4 vibroswords. Somehow, he had used each of them in his felling of the beast. 

“Excellent performance.” Nomas cheered. “Truly moving.” He climbed off mutilated corpse, and began to slowly re-sheath his blades; no effort was made to clean the blood off them.

Boba opened his mouth to say something, but thought better of it. He simply holstered his weapons and motioned Ynala to follow him.

“Harkh, lets head out. You can find something to eat later,” Ynala said as she walked to Boba.

Harkh huffed as he ceased sniffing a very charred, smoking corpse and walked over as well. Apparently, Boba figured, blaster fire can actually injure these things; it only requires some very heavy and intense rapid fire. Then again, as far as Boba was concerned, the Trandoshan was basically walking around while carrying, what essentially is, a vehicle mounted artillery weapon.

Nomas finally finished collecting his gear and decided to gaze at his kill for a moment. With arms extended he proudly pronounced, “Look upon my work! Beautiful no?”

Boba stopped walking for a breath and glanced at the corpse. Somehow, through Nomas’ efforts, this was a more explicit sight than the beast that literally exploded. Boba didn’t know how much pain these beasts were capable of feeling, but Nomas had been rigorous in his experiments. While everyone else was busy, Nomas had somehow managed to score every pound of flesh on that damn creature. Truthfully, Boba was impressed with how maliciously Nomas had slayed his challenger.

He would never admit it to his face, however.

“Let’s go.” He ordered instead. “This was only an obstacle to finishing this mission. There will be more to slay along our path.”

“I can only hope so.” Nomas almost cheered. Boba didn’t have to see his face. He could already imagine the bloodthirsty smile on Nomas’ face.

Boba made an effort to move, but then paused. He tilted his head to Ynala.

She eventually noticed and could only ask “What?”

Boba was shocked. He had been sure that she would want to say something in response to the Duros brother’s death. He knew that Nomas and Harkh wouldn’t care and he sure didn’t; occupational hazard and all. “Oh well,” he thought. Boba brought his head back to the front and began walking again. “Nothing.” He replied.

With their task on the command deck completed, and the hostiles slain, the bounty hunters retraced their steps down the stairs to the lower deck. Where as before, they had to carefully climb through the make shift barricades created the surviving stormtroopers, no such obstacle existed now. 

“I think those beasts just walked right through everything.” Ynala theorized.

Nomas kicked a severed foot away and added, “Maybe stopped to eat the bodies too.” He laughed. “I suppose that is why it took so long for the fuckers to get to us. They took a snack break!”

As Boba led the group through the central hallway of the barrack, he suddenly got some very strange readings from his helmet’s sensors. “Wait what.” Boba muttered. He raised his hand to pause the group.

“See something?” Ynala asked.

“Scent in the air.” Harkh sniffed.

“Ya. That room is full of corpses. Of course, you do.” Nomas replied.

“Shut up.” Boba whispered to the hunters. “Slow approach.” Boba crept forward; the others eventually followed him.

The 4 remaining hunters slowly approached the doorway into the central area. Once they got to the wall, each of them slowly leaned their heads over and looked at what Boba’s sensors warned him about.

Once again, however, before Boba was even aware of what he was looking at, his head began to pound. As if the very air dramatically increased in weight and pressure, he felt like his own skull was just barely resisting a complete collapse. His heartrate started to drum louder and louder as blood rapidly raced throughout his body. Rapidly, his eyesight stopped absorbing anything of reality as it decayed to nothing but white. He was lucky that he was already leaning against a wall, else he would have collapsed to the floor again. Suddenly, a memory, vivid as if he was seeing it in reality, opened up in his mind. He didn’t know who, or what he was, but he was in a cage. It was small and through the iron bars caging him, he could see… a rancor. Or what he believed to be a rancor. And then, that same red skinned, robed figure from his prior vision approached it. He didn’t recognize the species, but … he felt fear anyway. He wasn’t sure if it was fear from the memory or from him. The robed man walked up to the rancor and then… and then… well, Boba didn’t know what he saw. The rancor roared in rage, likely do to being chained in place, but then it stopped. The roaring suddenly turned into cries of pain as the very body of the rancor shifted and mutated. Slowly, the ministrations of the robed man morphed the rancor into something new, something ferocious, and something obedient.

“What are they?” Boba heard. He looked side to side through the cage. Suddenly, his vision cleared up and he reawakened to reality. It seemed, Boba hoped, no one noticed him break down again. He refocused and listened to Harkh, Nomas, and Ynala discuss what laid beyond the doorway. Boba decided to look himself again. This time however, his brain absorbed the sight. The monsters he saw eating the corpses in the main room, well, they were remarkably close to the creature he saw in his vision.

“Is that a rancor?” Nomas asked. “I’ve never killed a rancor before.”

Ynala started to speak, but Boba was faster. “No.” Boba bit out through gritted teeth. His head was still unwilling to do anything beyond just existing. “No, its not a rancor. Its something different. Its something created.”

“What you mean?” Harkh tilted his head in confusion. 

Boba could only shrug. Even if the memory was only a fallacious hallucination, he knew what rancors looked like. He had seen Jabba feed prisoners to his pet enough times to know for sure. The two beasts currently gorging themselves definitely were not rancors. They were smaller, first of all, maybe one quarter the size of a bull rancor. Furthermore, both of the animals had massive spines growing from their backs and a pair of tusk flaps attached to their mouth; Mouths that were currently being fed using giant clawed hands.

“Terentatek.” Ynala muttered.

“Sorry what. You need to speak louder.” Nomas mocked. “Those things are eating very loudly.

“They are terentatek. They are creatures of the dark side of the force. Creating using Sith alchemy upon a rancor; at least so the theory goes.” She clarified.

Boba was confused. In all this time with Vader, he had never heard of Sith alchemy or its ability to create creatures as terrifying this. And he had seen a lot of the terrors that the Sith were capable off. Although, was that what he saw in that memory? A sith creating a terentatek from scratch? “How do you know this?” he decided to ask.

“They hunt and feed upon the blood of Force Sensitives. I am a miruluka; my very species is implicitly force sensitive.” She answered back in a whisper.

“Seems to me that you should have wiped that beast from the galaxy in that case.” Nomas replied.

Ynala had an angry tint to her voice. “Did you not hear what I just said you blood thirsty heathen. They are created. You can’t wipe them out.” She paused to collect herself. “In any case, it actually has been attempted; hunting them to extinction I mean. They are strong and prevalent during times of the Sith. And whenever Jedi succeed in casting the Sith down, these things tended to hibernate and remain dormant until the Sith returned.” She explained.

“So hunt them down.” Harkh replied.

“The jedi of old tried. They sent scores upon scores of kill squads after them. But after hundreds of missing or dead jedi, the council decided to leave it alone.” She replied. “Remember, for all intents and purposes, these things were made to kill jedi.”

“Well we aren’t Jedi.” Boba said. “Do you think these were made fresh here?” He asked.

“I don’t know how the Remnant could have evaded the New Republic with this let loose upon them.”

“Well, let’s assume that the beasts from earlier were also created.” Boba theorized. “I think I agree with your earlier theory.” Boba said to Ynala. “I think this whole situation reeks of a few young Sith who got access to too much power too quickly.”

“Do you think the holocron we are looking for…” She left unfinished.

“Definitely.” Boba answered. “Some young Dark Jedi accessed the holocron and started experimenting.”

“Ha.” Nomas chuckled. “All this,” he gestured, “is because some rookie blew his load.” 

“In any case,” Ynala continued as if Nomas said nothing, “I understand why the New Republic wanted the holocron so much.” To Boba, she spoke as if she was in awe, amazement even. “Such knowledge could destroy armies and nations; it could massacre entire planets.”

“Yes, well,” Boba tried to end that line of thought, “We need to get the holocron first.”

“Need to get through beasts first.” Harkh corrected.

“Yes, that does seem to be the problem right now.” Nomas confirmed. He looked down at his sheathed blades. “I don’t know, I think I could still cut through them.”

“Their skin can resist lightsabers.” Ynala hissed angerly.

Nomas took out a pair of blades and flourished them to show off. As gore and blood flew off them, he replied with, “So can these.”

“Those jedi kill teams,” Boba began. “If a terentatek hide can resist a lightsaber, how did they slay them?” he asked.

“The ones who were successful?” Ynala asked to clarify. “From the stories I know, there were two steps. First, the team had to all have a close tight bond with each other. It was necessary to resist the dark aura of the beast.”

“Not a viable option for us.” Nomas chuckled.

“The second step,” Ynala continued annoyed, “was with pure power. The old jedi used untempered, raw, power. Some of the old jedi who slayed terentateks were among the strongest of their time; Knights like Ulic Qel Droma and Lord Revan.

“Power we can do.” Harkh commented as he hefted his giant weapon.

“Yes, we can do that,” Boba agreed. “There are two terentateks standing there.” He counted. “As such, I suppose the easiest way to handle it is splitting into 2 groups of 2.” He guessed.

“No,” Ynala disagreed. “Both groups would just die slowly. We need to overlord one of the groups, and hope that the other person can stall long enough for the first beast to be slain.”

For once, Nomas was serious. “Are you sure?” he asked.

Ynala nodded as a response.

“Ah.” Nomas muttered. “Well then, any volunteers?” He asked to no one specifically.

Boba silently did an internal inventory of his gear. He wasn’t sure if he could kill one of those by himself; 50/50 to be honest. The bigger issue was that he couldn’t be wasteful with his jetpack fuel, and he still had to save the good stuff for the dangers he was sure would come later. However, to his shock, an unlikely voice stepped up.

“I can fight.” Harkh growled.

“You sure,” Boba asked.

Harkh hefted his cannon as a response.

Boba nodded. He looked towards Ynala and Nomas. “In that case, how do we kill our target as fast as possible then?” he asked.

“Fast and bold,” Nomas answered. “We sneak as close as we can,” Nomas pointed at the beasts, “After all they clearly are distracted. And we alpha strike them.” Nomas looked at Boba. “I liked what you did against the beast earlier. The blind girl and me will take out its legs. You get in close and blast into its mouth.”

Boba nodded. It was a good enough plan considering the situation. “Harkh, focus on living, not killing. We will help as soon as we can.” He said.

Harkh nodded and began to walk towards the doorway to cross into the main area. The rest of the group followed.

As Boba walked into the main deck, he noticed that, surprisingly enough, it actually was cleaner than he remembered. When he first visited, the room had been coated entirely with the bodies of the dead. Now, however, many of the corpses have been removed from the floor. No doubt, the terentateks have been busy eating. Boba didn’t care about that, but, if anything, it did help the crew sneak into place.

Soon, everyone got as close as they were willing. Frankly, Boba felt that the terentateks were eating quite loudly. Although, to be fair, if you are such an apex predator that even the Jedi are forced to fear you, what reason would you have to be scared of anything? Boba armed every explosive on his person; the mini rockets on his gauntlets, any available grenades, and the single rocket on his back. Looking at his allies, he could see that they had acted in a likewise manner. Nomas had decided to approach far closer to the beast than Boba had. Evidently, Nomas had a greater fascination with risk. He had decided not to bother with his usual style of duel wielding a pair of vibroswords. Instead, he was holding a single blade with both hands; no doubt deciding that he would need the additional leverage and strength provided by the focus that is gained when one stops fighting with two blades at once. Ynala had taken out her force pike and charged it to peak power. Personally, Boba had no idea how effective it would be, but he was ready to be surprised. If the visible bolts of electricity silently arcing out of the staff meant anything, it was going to be a pleasant surprise too. Harkh, tasked with holding the line, had climbed up a column and gotten onto a ledge. How he did that with the giant cannon, Boba didn’t know but he respected the effort; The height would no doubt be useful.

Everyone held their breath and made sure to make no false moves. It was up to Harkh to stall for time, so he had to make the first strike. With bought terentateks focused on him, it would enable Boba and pals to execute them unhindered as quickly as possible.

With a great reptilian roar, Harkh rained a wall of plasma down upon both terentateks. Immediately, it was clear to Boba that the rate of fire that Harkh used to kill the beast on the command deck, was on the low end of what that gun was capable of. Even as far away as Boba was, the heat radiating off the downpour of fire was scorching; the room even grew brighter overall. Although, for Boba, this wasn’t actually a good thing. All the gore and carnage in the room was easier to see now. The true savagery of the actions done in this room now clearly evident to all who can see. 

To the credit of Harkh, both terentateks staggered back as they felt the scores of heavy laser fire on their hides. However, to Boba’s shock and disappointed, the terentateks quickly recovered and charged towards Harkh.

Seeing the two beasts charge, Boba internally counted down until he would call Nomas and Ynala to charge. He looked to both of them to see if they were ready. Upon noticing his gaze, both of the hunters nodded back to him. Seeing the backs of both beasts, Boba called out the charge.

“Attack!” Boba yelled. The trio of hunters all charged the closest terentatek. The second, ignored beast, free of distraction, got to the column holding up Harkh’s platform and started to slash at it. Out of the corner of his eye, Boba noticed that the slashes were having next to no effect on the durasteel material and was satisfied to fully focus on his immediate target. 

Nomas charged towards the right leg of the terentatek. He immediately fell low to the ground and began to slide towards the beast’s ankle. Once he was close enough, he hefted his blade firmly with both hands and, with great effort, managed to stab into the meaty leg of the terentatek. As the terentatek roared in fury, discarding its focus on Harkh, Nomas grunted as he forced the blade diagonally up the beast’s leg.

“This shit is a lot bonier than I thought it would be,” Nomas whined. Eventually, his blade got to the terentatek’s kneecap at which point he stopped moving it. Instead of bothering to pull his blade out, he let go and pulled his second blade out of its sheathe. As he dodged a blind swipe from the beast, he refocused his attention to the its second leg and restarted the process.

As Nomas focused on mutilating the second thigh, Ynala ran up for her part of the battle. With a firm grasp on her charged force pike, she slammed it into the metal blade left behind by Nomas. Immediately, even before physical contact was made, the electricity arced from the staff to the blade. The metal of the blade then served as a guide for the full force generated by Ynala’s force pike to spike unresisted into the terentatek’s leg. Due to that high energy, the thigh muscle of the beast painfully contracted, forcing the beast to partially collapse. The beast’s remaining leg was forced to hold up its entire weight as the other simply shook in voltaic bursts of blood ridden movement.

Boba, witnessing Ynala and Nomas destroying the beast’s legs, positioned himself behind its body. Extending a hand, he shot out a grappling hook aimed at the animal’s neck. The hook flew true and wrapped around its intended target. Grabbing the rope with both hands, he started to pull, intending to trip the top-heavy beast onto its back. While it resisted his attempts, Boba was sure he could at least keep it in place as Ynala and Nomas destroyed its second leg. Once they completed their task, Boba had no doubt it would fall down and be unable to resist any of the hunter’s further actions.

However, just as everything was going to plan, a large, piercing creak echoed throughout the deck. Turning his head to the source, Boba was shocked to see that the durasteel column supporting Harkh, had deep gouges into it. Able to divert his focus for a moment, Boba used his helmet’s visors to zoom in towards the second terentatek, currently busy with trying to eat Harkh. After a moment, it was unfortunately clear what happened.

“YNALA!” Boba shouted. “You forgot to mention the acid!”

“What?” Ynala yelled back. She was having difficulty hearing anything over the wails of fury from the beast as Nomas butchered its second leg.

Boba watched as the acid sweat out of the second terentatek’s claw. While each slash by itself did nothing to the column, it served to leave the highly corrosive acid onto it. That acid ate away at the integrity of the column allowing future attacks to actually cause massive damage.

“FINISH IT!” Boba yelled. “WE DON’T HAVE TIME!”

“REALLY BONEY THIGHS HERE.” Nomas responded as he cut through the leg muscles. “Going as fast as I can.”

Ynala looked in awe as the column began to buckle over. “To late.” She whispered.

The column holding the platform that Harkh was on collapsed. His laser fire ceased as he fell hard to the ground. Winced in pain, with his back on the floor, he put all his focus to normalizing his breathing again. Just as he was close to recollecting himself however, he felt a large, clawed hand grasp around his chest.

“AAHHHH!” Harkh screamed in agony as the claw quickly tightened around him. Dents in his powerful armor began to form as metal plates began to press painfully into his body. 

The rest of the hunters silently watched as Harkh was raised off the ground by the terentatek and brought near his mouth.

Luckily however, even though the pain, Harkh never released his grip on his weapon. While the beast intended the Trandoshan to go into his mouth, what it received instead was only the bayonet end of a gun. Harkh fought past the pain caused by the claw and acid around his waist as he used the blade to force the gun deeper into the terentatek’s mouth. He clicked the trigger and for a moment, there was nothing of remark to see for the other three hunters. But then, slowly, a red spot started to appear on the terentatek’s back. It started a dull red, but then it got brighter and brighter. Eventually, the beast began to act erratically as the red spot started steaming; its claws grew tighter around Harkh as it panicked.

Harkh, meanwhile, began to cough blood as he was physically crushed around his waist. However, to his credit, he refused to stop firing into the terentatek’s maw.

Nomas, on the other side of the fight, had finally finished brutalizing his target’s second thigh. Backing off, he waited for Ynala to do her part until he noticed that she was entranced by what was happening to Harkh. “YNALA. FINISH IT!” He yelled.

The sound forced her back to the real world as she looked around in temporary shock. Seeing the blade left behind by Nomas, she brought up her force pike and slammed into the blade just as she did before.

Finally, as the beast’s second leg began to stagger from the assault, Boba succeeded in collapsing it. With a great thud, the terentatek fell onto it back.

Mirroring that, the terentatek crushing Harkh finally had the red spot on its back explode in a vivid gore of plasma and flesh. Thousands of laser bolts from Harkh’s repeater used the newly created hole to escape the beast’s body. The animal staggered for a few steps before collapsing forward, crushing what remained of Harkh’s body. 

Completely focused on the matter in front of him, Nomas was able to ignore Harkh’s plight. Using his two remaining blades, he stabbed through the palms of the still living terentatek’s claws. Nailed into the ground, the beast could only roar in anger as, despite its great efforts, it failed to get off its back. It could only lie there and scream.

Boba let go of the grappling hook. As it clacked on the ground, he walked up to the terentatek’s head and climbed onto its forehead. Bringing up both his gauntlets, he aimed at the roaring mouth of the animal. Without mercy, he fired rockets and flames into its gaping maw.

After 30 seconds of relentless assault, the terentatek was no longer recognizable as one. Indeed, it would be hard to identify an animal that lacked a head and upper torso. Boba calmly climbed down from his perch and rejoined the two, remaining, surviving hunters.

Nomas and Ynala were talking about something when Boba got to them.

“Look I know you’re blind, but you have to pay a little more attention.” Nomas scolded.

Ynala huffed. “We weren’t in any risk.” She replied. She pointed to the beast that Harkh had killed at the cost of his life. “That creature was dead anyway.” She then pointed to their beast. “And we had already incapacitated its first leg. Me delaying for a few moments meant very little in the long run.”

“Sure princess.” Nomas scoffed. He walked to each of his blades and collected them. Inspecting his blade, he moaned as he felt the need to vocalize his disappointment. “By the way, nice job warning us about the acid.” He mocked. “You know, the reagent capable of dissolving materials normally resistant to plain attacks?” He carefully cleaned the blades as best he could and returned them to his person.

Boba could tell that Ynala didn’t appreciate having such scrutiny directed her way. 

“I did… I did say that I only knew these beasts by reputation.” She stammered. “My people carry on the legends of these monsters in story. It should be completely expected that some details get lost to time as scores of people pass the knowledge down to their descendants.”

Boba couldn’t resist a chuckle. “Well, they aren’t passing knowledge down then. They are passing stories down” He turned away and walked towards the door control panel. “Quite a different thing.”

“Well…” She started to retort, but stopped. She took a couple deep breathes and calmed down. “Some say that stories are the best knowledge to pass on.”

“Stories of blood maybe” Nomas whispered. “Not stories of senile old men”. He looked around. “Where did those things even come from?” he asked.

Boba pointed to the left as he approached the formally locked doors. “Didn’t notice it last time, but those gates opened up.”

To the left of the central deck were several doorways that led, to what Boba assumed, used to be storage. In the sense of the word, it still was storage, but instead of weapons and armor, it was full of bloody trooper armor; cracked and broken due to countless bite marks. 

“I think the beasts were waiting in there, content to eat whatever stormtroopers were locked in there with them.” Boba continued.

“The slaying of these beasts are not as worthy as a man.” Nomas muttered. “They bleed the same, but think less. There is no challenge here. I feel no satisfaction slaughtering animals.” He started to follow Boba. “I was promised Dark Jedi. Where are they?”

“Are you complaining that we haven’t encountered force users yet? Are you mad?” Ynala asked.

“Who isn’t mad? What is straight with this world right now? The Empire has fallen and a brand-new force has dominion; a force that is paying us to hunt down dissidents.” Nomas walked with a strut. “Regardless who is in charge, there will always be someone who wants someone dead. There will always be a hunt for me.”

“Savage.” Ynala simply stated. She joined Boba and Nomas near the door control panel.

“Shut it.” Boba commanded. He was bent over and busy manipulating the door controls. It was unlocked, but still required some additional commands. “I didn’t notice any lightsabers in that side room,” Boba commented. He finally found the command prompts he found. Before clicking it however, he turned back to his living compatriots, “You will still have dark jedi to slay.” He grimly said.

“Can’t wait.” Nomas grinned. While he had on blade leaning against his left shoulder, he played around with another blade using his right hand. “Speed and execution; that worked against jedi.” He stopped flourishing his blade and held it firmly. “I got plenty of that for the Sith too.”

Boba didn’t waste a moment. He looked towards Ynala, “You good?” He asked.

She nodded.

“Good.” Boba turned back and clicked the final prompt to open the giant doors. As the doors slowly slide open, he leaned and asked Ynala and extra question. “Do you still see the cancerous growth of the dark side’s aura?”

She nodded as the door continued to part. “Yes. I think those beasts were part of it, but there still is a malevolent aura radiating through this threshold.”

The massive doors finally parted and through it, the trio could see a quartet of dark jedi dueling with each other.

Suddenly, before any of the Sith could react, before even Boba could react, two vibroblades flew through the air. The first blade ripped right through a warrior’s unprotected throat. The sound of him crashing to the ground served to alert the other target of the blade flying towards him. As the blade approached him, the dark jedi turned his lightsaber towards it and split it in half. 

“Is this the blight you saw?” Nomas scoffed at Ynala. Before she could respond, he pulled out two of his remaining blades and charged.

She looked at Boba, understanding the situation. “How to kill Jedi: Strike hard and strike fast.” She pulled out her force pike and charged as well.

Boba smiled and began to provide covering fire. He had experience here; It’s really hard for any force user to employ their abilities effectively when in… high paced situations. The focus needed to use abilities such as lightning or telekinetics is difficult for younglings to use while their attention is divided. People like Lord Vader definitely had no such issues, but … based on what Boba has seen on this ship today, it screamed of young rookies who gained knowledge he wasn’t ready for.

With immense speed and incredible accuracy, Boba sent laserfire downrange towards the dark jedi. Each projectile, among the dozens flying, managed to evade his allies while still putting each dark jedi at risk. Boba could tell, that to deflect each approaching bolt, the dark jedi had to move erratically and to their very extremes so as to not get injured. For the obvious rookie dark jedi, the strain of such movements allowed Nomas and Ynala to approach unperturbed.

“BLEED!” Nomas shouted as he got into stabbing distance. He immediately engaged two of the dark jedi in a flurry of slashes and stabs. His blades a whirling storm of steel: it was clear that either the dark jedi were new to dueling or they were very, very tired. Even despite their best efforts, battle damage began to show. Whether it was a small cut on the thigh, or a splotch of blood along the upper arm, or clang as metal blade hit metal armor, it was obvious: Neither of the warriors could keep up with Nomas and they were slowly being pushed back. Even despite their best gambits with the lightsaber, and their most risky trades, they failed hit a return strike. Nomas’ acrobatics was certainly a feat to witness. He never stayed still, and every movement flowed almost erratically into the next. If you tried to guess his movement from the motion of his blades, you got kicked. If you tried to watch his feet, you get slashed. If you were somehow able to absorb his entire being, well good luck trying to figure out if his next moves were a pirouette, a parry, a dash, a slash, or a stab. And from the perspective of the two Sith, it certainly didn’t help that every time they got close to hitting Nomas in a blind spot caused by a reckless caviler swing, Boba provided more covering fire to save him from retaliation. No doubt, they must have been getting angry.

Although, speaking from personal experience, Boba knew that making a Sith angry isn’t always the best move to make. 

Ynala, meanwhile, charged the remaining Dark jedi using the same covering fire that Nomas had received. With her force pike extended and fully charged, she clashed with the remaining warrior. Two blades engaged back and forth as electricity sparked with each impact. Clearly aware of the abilities of her weapon, every one of Ynala’s movements were calculated to make each voltaic discharge as completely irritating to her foe as possible. Even without Boba’s strategic plasma fire, the constant micro-electrocutions forced upon the dark jedi definitely would have killed his intent and focus. Her blows were skillful and precise; almost a polar opposite to Nomas’ movements. Each thrust and each block was flawless and clean. Her battle style very clearly developed to make full use of the force staff’s electrical side effects. Ynala would stall an opponent as long as possible, while simultaneously forcing said opponent to endure the constant irritation of thunderstrikes on their person. Eventually, their movements would falter and thus enable a hole for her to take advantage of.

However, her Sith enemy was clearly unwilling to let her plan play out. While the lightning didn’t hurt him as much as it would a normal foe, it clearly did sting enough to disrupt his concentration. Unable to bring the full strength of his will to bear, the dark jedi instead decided to fight almost as savagely as Nomas. He used kicks. He used punches. He used grapples. He used any physical technique he could to rebalance the odds of their one on one fight.

Luckily for Ynala though, this wasn’t a one on one fight; Boba was still here. To his keen eye, the foe engaged with Ynala was far more skilled than the two currently battling Nomas. After all, this had been the warrior to bisect the blade that Nomas had thrown in an alpha strike; the remains of which had fallen close to where Nomas was currently battling. Making a decision, Boba decided to let Nomas to his fate; he was winning his fight.

If anything, it seemed to Boba that each near blow encouraged Nomas to get more reckless in his fighting.

“You’ll be fine,” Boba muttered. He brought out his pistol and used it to add more fire downrange. The dark jedi soon found any potential movements he could make a lot more limited under the massive amount of bolts spiking towards him. He tried to maneuver Ynala into the direction of the fire, but luckily, Boba could move as well. No matter how the Dark Jedi repositioned himself, Boba always managed to precisely support Ynala.

“I could have done this myself,” She muttered under her breathe. She was clearly aware of the fact that Boba was focusing entirely on her duel; how could she not. There was a near continuously rain of fire coming from her back flank. Indeed, it served to cripple the dark jedi’s movement so critically, that his assault capabilities were almost completely neutralized; he was purely stuck to defense. And unless Boba ceased his fire, there was a near-zero chance of him reclaiming the advantage. Deciding to just accept the situation, Ynala became bolder with her blows, confident in Boba’s assistance.

“Now she’s getting it.” Boba grinned.

Her movements started to sway more and more as she opened up further windows for Boba’s blasters. Left with no choice, the Dark Jedi had to mirror her actions as well; playing into her hand even further. The blasts of electricity visually began to bother him more and more. And as he got angrier, he got sloppier; sloppiness that led to Ynala getting increased blows upon him.

After only a few more moments, he could no longer keep up; with Ynala’s physical attacks or Boba’s blaster bolts.

He collapsed to the floor; a burned and singed corpse. His lightsaber automatically de-igniting as it clattered onto the floor.

Ynala almost fell as well, but used her hands to catch herself on her knees. Her style implicitly exhausting, she needed to moment. 

Boba meanwhile looked back towards Nomas. He had a few singed spots on his armor, but for the most part he seemed fine. Although, as Boba watched him, there as an extremely close call as his helmet got slashed by a saber.

Boba wasn’t scared or worried. Because as Nomas’ helmet broke apart and fell to the floor, there was a massive, bloodthirsty grin on his face. He was having fun. 

“Wait a second,” Boba muttered.

Looking at Nomas’ fighting style again, it actually looked like he was purposely enlengthening the fight. Instead of dodging and counterattacking, like he did at the start of the fight, he was winding and binding a lot more.

“That fucker is trying to show off!” Boba exclaimed in realization. “Finish it” Boba shouted.

But Nomas didn’t react. He seemed intent to show off his abilities. To whom, Boba didn’t know. But Boba decided to put his spectacle to an end; it was time to move on.

With just as much speed as before, Boba quick fired his blasters towards Nomas’ opponents. They were clearly exhausted due to Nomas’ efforts. Indeed, he probably could have won this fight already. It didn’t matter though; they would lose now.

The Sith saw the incoming fire, but couldn’t react. They were too tired and too distracted. However, curiously enough, it seemed that Nomas was the angriest from Boba’s interdiction.

“Nooo!” he yelled. “This is mine now!”. He purposely clashed both his blades into the Sith’s respective sabers. Then using some clever pivots, he maneuvered his very opponents away from the blasts; protecting them with his back.

Boba chose to stop firing. “Moron,” he muttered. He looked at Ynala and saw that she had just barely caught her breath again. He began to run over to assist the process. But he noticed something very unfortunate as he ran to her.

Nomas had clearly not paid attention to the state of his blades. If they were fresh, Boba had no doubt that they would have been able to engage a lightsaber all day long. But they weren’t fresh. They had all come into contact with the highly corrosive venom of the beastly terentatek. Damage was very clearly done, but Nomas was fighting as if it wasn’t.

Foreseeing what was about to happen, Boba discarded the attention he was giving to Ynala and immediately began firing at the two dark jedi again.

Upon seeing the fire returning, Nomas roared in anger. He once again purposely used his blades to catch both lightsabers of the Sith; but this time, the blades faltered.

“What?” Nomas half heartily muttered, almost in shock as he watched his two vibroswords falter from their contact with the lightsabers. He continued to watch in shock as both sabers continued down, through his guard and through into him. He collapsed to the floor, dropping the remains of his blades, with two gaping, cauterized wounds in his chest.

Boba aimed carefully and knew he had to move quickly. Ynala was still out of commission and the advantage of surprise was lost. As his mind raced through, he suddenly heard laughter.

“Oh, this wasn’t fair.” Nomas laughed through the pain. “This was not fair.”

The two Sith looked down at him in confusion. Confident that Boba wasn’t a threat at the moment, they went back to Nomas to finish the job.

However, just as they raised their blades to strike him once more, a pain ridden smile manifested on Nomas’ face. “Too telegraphed.” He muttered. Fighting through the pain, Nomas quickly grabbed two of the blade-ends of his destroyed swords.

Which swords those blades where originally from, Boba had no idea. But he couldn’t deny the awe he had as Nomas firmly grasped those swords all the same, and launched up. Despite the pain, both blades reached the mark.

As Nomas fell back to the floor, his remaining energy used in this last assault, he was joined by two dead dark jedi; blades firmly lodged into their necks.

Boba could only nod in approval. That bastard had been crazy and unhinged, but he was good at what he did.

Being crazy and unhinged.

“What happened?” Ynala gasped out. She had just now recovered and had missed Nomas’ final moments.

“Its just us two now.” Boba answered.

“What,” Ynala asked. She looked at Nomas and the two dead Sith lying on top of him. “Ah.” She whispered. She slowly stood straight back up, and deactivated her force pike.

Or at least she attempted too. Boba had other ideas though.

“Not yet,” Boba said. At Ynala’s confused face, he clarified. “Those were nothing but young acolytes. I refuse to believe that this was it.” Boba paused. He pointed towards a door not yet explored. “The strongest one of these dark jedi will be with the holocron. That is usually how their kind works.”

Ynala was curious. “Are you sure?”

“Yes,” Boba confirmed. “It’s how the Sith work.” He explained. “There is one with power and knowledge, and there are others who seek it. The strongest one will be with the holocron. I guarantee it.” He began to walk forward at a slow pace; Boba wasn’t in a hurry.

However, as Boba went, he noticed Ynala outpace him. “Are you okay?” He asked. No response. She seemed to be focused on whatever dark aura was coming from the holocron. “No matter,” Boba shrugged. He followed her instead of leading the way.

After a few moments of walking, Boba and Ynala reached the door.

“It’s behind here.” Ynala declared.

“You sure?” Boba asked.

“Definitely.” She nodded. “The epicenter of the aura is coming from beyond...” She paused to take it all in. “this door.”

Boba attempted to think back. It was difficult to comb through his mind; it was so twisted between his own thoughts and the thoughts of those stolen from the Sarlacc. Ultimately, the memory he recalled might have come from his own mind or not; Boba didn’t care. It was useful all the same.

“On temple ships, this area of the ship is usually a secondary observation deck or a mediation room.” Boba paused for a moment before shrugging. “Maybe both.”

“Well, based on the density of the radiation, it certainly feels like the latter.” She gave her force pike a once over as she confirmed its status. Satisfied, she looked over to Boba once again and ask, “Are you ready?”

“Killing Jedi, dark or not, is nothing new.” Boba replied. He walked up to the door and looked over the controls. Within moments, Boba went through the repetitive commands needed to open these final doors. After inputting the final splice, he stepped back to stand in line with Ynala. They both watched together, ready, as the last leg of the journey opened up before them.

Boba’s visor had difficulty revealing the contents of the room to him. The newly entered space was incredibly dark; as close to pitch black as it could have been. There were only two sources of light. The first, was a massive hole on the opposite end of the room exposing it to the void of space. It was ray shielded to stop the atmosphere from escaping, but still directed enough light into the room to be noticeable. The second source was a massive central pedestal with the Sith holocron resting right upon it. Said holocron visibly pulsed red; bright enough with its Sith energies, that even a force insensitive like Boba could see it. The hologram was surrounded by massive stone structures encircling it; it almost appeared as if a great claw rose from the ground to grasp at the holocron. In between each of the regularly placed structures were low seats no doubt meant for meditation… or worship. And Boba wasn’t sure, but it appeared that one of the seats was larger than the others.

It was difficult to focus on that detail though. The holocron called out to him. In fact, Boba assumed it called out to everyone. It was seductive in a way that felt wrong. Every single moment of attention you gave it, seemed like it had a cost; as if it carved a fragment of your very soul with each thought. Every second that Boba gazed upon it longer, it felt as if a whisper started to get louder and louder in his head. All the other voices and all the other memories went quiet, he could just hear the holocron.

“Fuck,” Boba whispered. He was used to this sort of stuff due to his former interactions with Lord Vader. But was Ynala, he wondered? He glanced at her. She stood straight up; perfect posture. Boba couldn’t tell where exactly a Miraluka like her was focused, but her head was dead centered right on the relic.

She began to take a step forward, but Boba extended an arm to stop her.

“What?” Ynala exclaimed.

Boba wasn’t sure what emotion was behind that; Was it confusion… or perhaps anger?

Ynala didn’t wait for Boba to react before speaking again though. She quickly pointed towards the central geyser of taint. “The holocron is right there. We can take it and return to the New Republic.”

“Remember what I said.” Boba softly spoke. He firmly turned his head towards the chair that felt too large. “The strongest will be with the holocron.”

With some… difficulty, Ynala joined Boba’s gaze towards the chair, but she gritted. “Its so hard to see anything with the holocron so close.”

Then, the chair seemed to get bigger and bigger until Boba could clearly identify what was actually a being who had prostrated themselves before the holocron. As the being slowly stood forth, he spoke in a slow, deep, dry tone.

“Yes, it is marvelous isn’t?” The figure whispered.

He walked closer towards the holocron, the red tint revealing his almost noble, deathly pale patrician features. He was a tall man, but thin; almost to the point of emaciation. Over his body, he wore black trousers, a high-collared tunic, and boots. This was all enshrouded in an open robe covered in, what Boba could only assume, was Sith iconography.

As he opened his mouth to speak, his head was directed towards Boba and Ynala, but his yellow eyes were entirely enamored with the holocron. “When Master Jerec entrusted this to me, he had described its almost alluring qualities.”

Boba could tell that he peaked out of the corner of his eyes to gaze upon them before returning back to looking at the holocron.

“Ah, you are Miraluka as well. I imagine you are seeing the very same power that he saw.” He commented. With a hand reaching out, he began to walk around the holocron, almost grabbing it but never quite doing so. “Master Jerec made me promise to keep this safe, to keep it away from Skywalker.” He muttered. “He said that this knowledge, this precious knowledge discovered by Lord Sidious himself, must be kept safe so that it could be given to the Dark Lady Lumiya.” 

Boba pulled out a blaster and sent a few fast bolts downrange. However, the man clenched his hands and both Boba and Ynala fell to their knees. What few blaster bolts did make it to the man were promptly deflected with a quick ignition of a lone red lightsaber.

He filled the room with a painful wheezing laugh as he de-energized his lightsaber. “Oh, I’m sorry, were you in a hurry somewhere?” He ceased looking at the holocron and gave the pair his full attention. “Where could you possibly want to go after seeing this glorious thing?” He walked closer. “For a while, I evaded the New Republic. Like a good apprentice I listened to my master and ran. But…” he paused. “After a while, a thought appeared… There is such knowledge in that crystal.” He pointed at it. “If I could unlock it and figure it out, to employ it practically, well I could take over Jerec’s place as leader of the Inquistorius.” He lowered his head in thought. “Well, I almost made it, I suppose. Traitors those soldiers; all of them.” He then knelt down to Boba and looked right into his visored face. “Tell me, when you got past the great locked door, were there any other of my kin?”

Boba said nothing. But then, to his surprise, Ynala spoke up.

“There were four…” she had trouble speaking, “four of them sparring.”

The man stood back up straight and walked, once again, towards the holocron. He gazed at it; his back exposed to the pair of them still stuck on the ground. He laughed once again in a malevolent tone. Once he finished, he began speaking again in a whisper. “Sparring? If only.”

He paused to think out loud. “To be united in hatred … is temporary at best. Whether that hatred is towards a scorned lover, a brother, the Jedi, the New Republic, or an old balding master past his prime; the bond will only last as long as there is a shared goal, a common interest.” He stood straight, no swaying and no movement, eyes locked at the holocron. “I don’t need them though. I have exactly what I need to rise.” His head pivoted towards the hole at the end of the room. The black void of space still seemed to be slightly brighter than the room they were in. “I wish to thank you for coming.” He gestured towards the hole. “I needed a new ship.”

Boba, still trapped on his knees, finally managed to inch his fingers closer to his gauntlet. “I’ll help you outside.” Boba muttered. With a great blast, the rocket lying on top of his jetpack ignited.

“WHAT!” the Sith heard the noise and turned around. Just as the rocket left its place, he held out his hand and fought to keep the missile in place.

Feeling the force restraining him grow weaker, Boba forced his other hand up and aimed it at the holocron. He could see the panic in the deep yellow eyes of the Sith. “I will make you choose.” Boba said. “Holocron or Air.” He fired dozens of microrockets towards the podium.

The Sith didn’t even hesitate. He immediately relinquished control of the initial rocket. And as it flew towards the ray-shielded hole in the back of the room, the Sith jumped in front of the microrockets. Both targets, the intentional and accidental, endured explosions.

Boba felt all restraint on him vanish. He immediately turned to Ynala and shouted. “There is going to be a vacuum. Sync your radio to mine and be careful.”

She nodded and stood up herself.

Boba turned back to the Sith. At this point, the explosion in the back of the room had completely overloaded what remained of the ray shield and atmosphere was quickly escaping into the void. Most of his clothing had been burned away due to the rockets. He now stood with a burned face and scorched set of underarmor. He took as deep a breath as he could from what little air was left in the room and began to walk menacingly towards the pair of hunters.

“What?” Boba was confused and expressed so to Ynala. “How is he fine?”

“Breath Control.” Ynala answered over the radio. “It allows a force user to survive with very little air.”

It was harder for the Sith to walk due to the air rushing out, but he still kept moving all the same. He once again grabbed his lightsaber, and ignited it.

“Forever?” Boba asked.

“No.” Ynala answered.

“Fantastic,” Boba replied. He brought up his pistol and sent shots, once again, towards the holocron.

Immediately, the Sith overextended with his saber in a desperate attempt to defend it. He manages to deflect all the bolts but one, which impacted safely away from the holocron.

“What are you doing!?” Ynala shouted. “I need that!”

“So does he.” Boba replied. “The only thing stopping him from killing us instantly with the force is a split focus.” He explained. “Don’t let him reclaim it!”

Ynalla nodded and charged forward with her force pike.

At this point, the pressure between the void of space and the room had equalized; somewhere between 0 and 1.

And it was clear to Boba that both warriors were having trouble moving in the vacuum. Although, interestingly enough, Boba felt like he could move fine. Testing himself for a moment, he was pretty sure that the artificial gravity was still working. So maybe it was just the continuous blasts of radiation coming from the holocron that was distracting Ynala. Either way, Boba aided her with supporting fire.

Most of the bolts were directed at the Sith, while a smaller, non-trivial amount flew towards the holocron. Truthfully, Boba had to suppress a laugh as he watched the warrior contort his stance abnormally to continuously defend himself from the Bounty Hunters, while also defending the holocron from any wayward lances of plasma. Although, Boba considered, it did state truth to the man’s level of skill.

He was far more impressive than the 4 warriors that Boba, Ynala, and Nomas had slain. His control with the single blade was definitely a match to Ynala’s own skills. Every blow she threw was deftly parried. Every trick and trap that she attempted to employ was promptly seen through and avoided. Meanwhile, she was slowly being pushed back; No longer on the offensive, she was forced to focus on her own defensive posture more and more; even despite the distractions plaguing the Sith. She couldn’t even rely upon her usual handicap. The vacuum proved a terrible conductor and the electrically sparking off the force pike was tiny and insignificant. 

Indeed, Boba imagined that unlike her prior duel, his aid wasn’t optional, it was necessary. It could have been due to any number of reasons: the vacuum, the exhaustion, the pulsating energy of the holocron. The results would have been the same regardless. Ynala was being pushed back even with Boba’s help and if Boba wasn’t here, then she would have already been dead.

“How long I wonder?” a voice echoed to Boba. “How long can you hold on?” it finished.

“What did you say!” Boba shouted.

“I didn’t say anything!” Ynala responded.

Her voice was tired and already gasping for air - consuming it as soon as her suit could supply it.

“What the?” Boba muttered. Was he hearing something more from the sarlacc’s memories?

“No.” the voice answered.

“Crap.” Boba thought.

He heard an echo of laughter in his head. Interestingly enough, the laugh was much fuller and weightier when projected into his head. “Indeed.” There was a pause as Boba felt his head get heavy. He couldn’t quite describe it, but it felt as if the Sith was trying to get deeper in his mind. With practiced experience, Boba did his best to shut him out.

“No matter.” The voice responded to Boba’s thoughts. “I can tell you have stolen some very interesting things. Things relevant to the knowledge in the holocron.” The voice paused as the Sith had to deflect a thrust from Ynala. After a sidestep and return slash, the voice returned. “I will keep you alive. I will have plenty of time to get what I want from you.”

With intense fury and righteous focus, Boba unleashed everything he had. Chemical spray and micro-rockets shot out from his wrist. Rifle and pistol fire rained across the room. And grenades were tossed to ever corner of the room. Most of it was focused on either the holocron and the Sith; but not all of it. That would have been too easy. Boba had to keep the Sith unsure of what was going where.

And to Boba’s satisfaction, the weight upon his mind left; not all of it but enough. The Sith was entirely focused on the storm of arms being brought to bear upon him. He had to find creative ways to position his single blade to block both Ynala’s force pike and any blaster fire heading towards him. He had to constantly jump around the room to avoid the blasts caused by the grenade explosions. What little focus he had left, had to be used to deflect rockets and acid away from his person.

And above all, he had to defend the holocron. He took many blows and hits, that could have been avoided, in pursuit of ensuring the sanctity of the crystal. Increasingly as the fight went on, his armor and visage started to get more and more damaged. It was Boba’s opinion, that if this fight went long enough, the Sith would lose. Whether due to Ynala’s rigorous pike attacks or Boba’s relentless ranged assault or the Sith’s own unrelenting defense of the holocron, this fight would be a victory for the Bounty hunters.

Until, it went wrong. All of a sudden, the Sith used his lightsaber to bite into Ynala’s force pike. Using his superior leverage and strength, he kicked her to the floor. And before Boba could adjust his fire to assist her, the Sith rose into the air, hovered for a moment, and then exploded out with a massive burst of power.

That burst pushed Ynala, who was just starting to stand, right back into the floor. It reversed the travel vector of every single blaster bolt, rocket, and grenade in the room. Most exploded against the wall, some escaped into space, and fewer where directed to Boba’s current position. Luckily, or unluckily, for Boba, he was also launched from his current spot and slammed painfully into the wall. On the bright side, he evaded the explosives that the wave sent his way. On the down side, he was currently on the floor, desperately trying to reclaim the air knocked out of him.

“ENOUGH!” The Sith shouted in his mind.

Boba managed to look up and see the Sith slowly begin to walk towards him.

“Don’t bother asking your Miraluka friend. That was called a Force Repulse. To do it, I gather energy within myself before expelling it all outward. I didn’t use the most powerful form of this technique, so be grateful that you aren’t standing before me a pile of ash.”

The Sith’s voice echoed within Boba’s mind. “Get out of head!” Boba screamed. Instead of obeying his demands, Boba only heard chackling.

“It is rather crowded in here, what with all the memories that aren’t yours.” The Sith projected. Suddenly, his voice grew grimmer and more unhinged. “I will look forward to ripping your mind apart; thought by thought.”

Boba thought back to him. “Look me in the eye and say that.”

The more joyful, mocking chuckling returned. “I would rather not. After all, you need your helmet to breathe.” He took a moment. “Although you are failing at doing that as well.” He started to step forward. “I’ll look into your helmet for you though.”

The Sith approached Boba Fett. Rather than bending down to Boba’s level, he used the force to levitate Boba off the ground. Soon, Boba felt weightless, as if he was in a true vacuum.

Face to Helmet, the Sith projected into Boba’s mind. “My face will be the last conscious memory you have.”

Then suddenly, a green lightsaber blade pierced the Sith’s chest. Due to the Sith’s shock, and his pain, Boba was released from the air. Landing with boots firmly on the ground, Boba flourished his lightsaber and thought over to the Sith. “What’s the matter? Surprised to see a lowly bounty hunter wielding such a noble weapon?”

The Sith didn’t respond. Lying with his back on the floor, the man was clearly trying to mentally deal with the wound without faltering his use of breath control. To fail here would mean to suffocate in the void of space.

But Boba could still feel his the Sith’s mind linked with his own. He continued to taunt back. “You are not the only one who has hunted jedi; who has slain jedi.”

Boba began to slowly walk towards the Sith. He slowly started to crawl back.

He wasn’t fast enough.

Boba quickly caught up to him, and with a mental “Goodbye,” promptly executed the man. His head fell silently to the ground. With no air resistance in the room, the momentum from the decapitation launched it away.

Satisfied, Boba de-ignited the saber, and returned it to his belt. He furthermore took a second to collect all the weapons that had been scattered due to the blast.

And then, he simply breathed deeply. After a few calming moments, Boba returned to feeling normal. Or at least as normal has he had been since first escaping the sarlacc.

Once his mind returned to a more placid state, He suddenly remembered Ynala. She must have been impacted by the force repulse much harder than him, considered that she didn’t assist at all in the exchange he just had. He looked to where he remembered her falling and didn’t see her. With a moment of sadness, he looked towards the center of the room.

There she was. Resting on her knees with her arms on the podium; Her head was but inches away from the holocron. He couldn’t see her face, and hell she didn’t have working eyeballs to begin with, but her focus was entirely on the red crystal.

“Ynala?” Boba questioned.

She didn’t respond; So captured by the red pyramid on the podium, she probably wouldn’t have even realized if the room suddenly re-pressurized.

At first, Boba thought his radio had broken during his fight, but a quick check falsified that claim. He walked closer to her and placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Oh,” Ynala exclaimed startled. “I didn’t notice you.” She didn’t even nod at him.

“Hmmmm,” Boba echoed back over the radio.

“This is so incredible.” Ynala began. “It’s like staring into a beating heart of power. A geyser that never stops erupting.”

“Perhaps.” Boba nonchalantly responded. “I am sure the New Republic will be very careful with it.”

That made her turn, and turn quickly.

“What?” She asked. “Aren’t we keeping it?”

“We?” Boba thought. He shook his head. “Why would we do that?” he asked. “Afterall, we were hired to deliver it to them.”

She positioned her body as a mother bear would to protect a cub; Every subconscious movement of hers directed to break Boba’s line of sight with the holocron. “Well, uh,” she muttered. “This is so dangerous; we surely could just hold onto it.” She seemed in approval of that line of thought; slowly nodding more and more as she spoke. “The New Republic is but an infant in control of the galaxy. How could we trust them with something this powerful?”

As Ynala spoke and emoted, it became more and more clear to Boba what had happened. He had seen this before during his travels with Lord Vader.

There was only one way this could move forward.

“Sounds like a plan.” Boba muttered.

“Yeeessss.” Ynala slurred out. She turned back around and just gazed upon the holocron. “I can keep this safe myself.”

Boba held firm. Standing straight up and resolute, he grasped a pistol from his holster and brought it right up to her temple.

She didn’t notice the movement whatsoever. 

“Yes, you can.” Boba silently replied.

He pulled the trigger.

A single laser bolt left the barrel of the gun and impacted on her head.

She fell to the ground. There was no impact, there was no sound. It just was.

With a sigh, Boba turned to face the holocron himself. He reached out a hand to grasp it; intent on finally finishing this mission before he died too. 

And then, his head once again felt heavy.

“NO!” Boba yelled. “NOT AGAIN!”

He felt as if he could barely support the weight of his own head; like a child. He almost collapsed to the ground, but barely caught himself by shooting his hands onto the podium. Unfortunately, his legs also faltered soon after and he fell regardless. It was a slow fall. One where every second felt like an eternity.

With his head uselessly lying on the podium, all he saw was the holocron.

The holocron. The red tint of it soon absorbed his entire vision. He could see nothing else but the pulsating beat of the dark side.

Beat. Beat. Beat.

The red that controlled his sight stirred his very heart and mind. It was almost as if it searched his mind for something. Memories were brought up, scrutinized, and then discarded for the next. Boba had no idea was happening, but his head pounded, feeling denser and denser as his very psyche ripped apart.

And then it stopped. The red that controlled his vision began to slowly fade until a figure about to grab the holocron could be seen.

At first, Boba could only see the hands reaching for the crystal. They were red skinned and adorned with jet-black gauntlets with red accents. On the back of each gauntleted hand were great, subtly glowing, green jewels. 

He could feel the power that the jewels represented. But before he could consider it, the rest of the being came into vision. 

It was the same near-human he had seen before. The one of a crimson hue and a fierce predatory look about him; as if his piercing yellow eyes were always gauging the value of whatever, or whomever, he was looking at. The gold embossed, black helmet on his face made the effect more paramount.

Zooming out, Boba could see that man was massive; with a set of armor that only served to enhance the man’s stature. It was an elaborate, black and gold-plated set of armor that had a red cape falling down its back. He had spikes along his pauldrons and an image of a single massive red eye centered on his chest plate.

And as Boba focused on that red eye, his vision slowly got more and more blurry.

He blinked in a vain attempt to clear his sight, to get a better idea of whom he was looking at. But as he did so, the red of the eye slowly morphed into the red of the holocron.

“What?” Boba exclaimed.

He slowly forced himself to his feet and gazed all across the room; looking for anything.

There was nothing in this room; Nothing but him, the holocron, the twin dead bodies, and the void of space.

The red being he had seen was gone. Or rather, was he ever really here to begin with?

Boba frowned. “I hate the force.” He muttered.

With more care and respect, he once again made an attempt to grab the holocron. While reaching for the object, Boba had firmly positioned himself; feet locked in place, and a second hand stabilized on the podium.

But this time, as with all the other times, there was no secondary vision.

Boba easily picked up the holocron.

“All this for a damn memory crystal.” He muttered.

Boba turned around and carefully, began to make his way out of the vacuum ridden mediation hall. He slowly evaded the two corpses on the ground; Of the Sith and of Ynala.

He walked to the door that had automatically sealed once the ray shielding had failed in the room.

“Ah shit.” He muttered.

After a few moments of investigating the door controls, he couldn’t find a way to open it. Due to the failed ray shielding, compartmentalization protocol was in full effect. The door would refuse to open until a vacuum was no longer detected.

With a deep exhale, Boba sighed. “Oh well. I didn’t want to walk through all the filth and nightmare anyway.”

He turned back around and walked towards the massive hole in the ship. He still had some fuel left in his jetpack and could probably make it back to the transport vessel that had ferried the hunters here.

He eventually got to the threshold, the vast emptiness of space in front of him. And if he zoomed in, using his helmet’s sensors, he could just make out his ship in the distance.

Boba made sure he had a firm grip of the crystal and took a leap. Once his inertia had carried him far enough away from the frigate, he engaged his thrusters and sped towards his escape.

As he zoomed back, he couldn’t help but admit to himself that it was a shame to be returning by himself. But he banished such thoughts to the pits of his mind; a hole that has gotten very deep and very dense since his time in the sarlacc. As he said mentioned to that wannabe on Tatooine, this job is ruthless. Every member of the squad was well aware of the risks that came with this job. And while they no doubt had different reasons as to why they accepted the title and contract, death comes easily to all.

“This isn’t helping.” Boba muttered.

To distract himself, he started messing with some controls on his gauntlet. He was getting closer to the ship and had to open the loading doors so that he could enter. Somehow, they had closed since originally leaving to start the mission. A small annoyance of a problem, but it was just enough to distract Boba.

With no further thought, the doors slowly opened with a hiss, and Boba skillfully stepped onto it. Grabbing hold of the arm guides, Boba slowly made his way inside, before closing the doors.

The ship seemed empty now. The walk from the loading doors to the cockpit seemed a lot longer than it once did. When he made it to the front, he took a seat in the pilot’s chair and enabled re-pressurization of the ship. A gentle hissing filled the ship, as air filled up the vacuum. While Boba waited for that process to finish, he activated the communicator and attempted to contact the New Republic. After a few moments of fiddling, someone came through.

“This is the Salvation-II,” a female voice said. “Unidentified bogey, please report why you are on this frequency.”

“This is the Bounty Hunter Reclamation Group: Verification CODE: TC1138.” Boba answered.

“Oh. Hold for a moment.” The female said.

Boba could hear muffled speech on the other side of the radio. There was the implication of hurried movement until eventually, a very familiar voice began speaking to him.

“This is Commodore Eclipse of the Salvation II.” One Juno Eclipse said.

“Greetings.” Boba deadpanned. “I am calling for pickup.”

“I am assuming that the mission was successful?” Eclipse postured.

“Indeed.” Boba confirmed. He used his hand to tap the red pyramid; not that Eclipse could see that. “The holocron has been secured and is currently in my presence.”

There was a pause from the other side of the radio until a hesitant Eclipse began to speak again. “You said my, not our.” Eclipse said. “I assume that means causalities.”

Boba didn’t falter. “Yes, unfortunately. Almost full causalities. I am the only survivor.”

“Ah.” Eclipse muttered. “Okay then. I assume you are still in the orbit around Hypori?” she stated more than asked.

Boba sent over his exact coordinates over the radio.

“All right. We are waiting just out of system. We will be there in just 30 minutes, your time.” She informed him. She turned off the radio connection before Boba could say anything more.

With nothing else to do but wait, Boba decided to take the time and relax. At this point, the ship was completely re-pressurized, so he took off his helmet and leaned all the way back in his seat. 

He tried to clear his mind, but he couldn’t help himself as thoughts erupted themselves to the forefront of his attention. Free time allows for a wandering brain after all. However, he wasn’t thinking about the other bounty hunters that died; he had been in many missions where fellow coworkers had died. Even as far back when he was still a child under Aurra Sing. People die, especially in his line of work. 

Instead, Boba thought about the many visions that he had seen throughout his time on that frigate. Throughout his exposure to the beasts of the dark side, almost every time, his mind had triggered a memory: Memories of creatures and a solitary being.

That being; the one who had been the single constant from vision to vision, the one who seemed inexplicably tied to the legacy of this Holocron.

At least Boba could only assume so. Unfortunately, he just didn’t have enough knowledge, historical or religious, to determine who it was. Considering the circumstances, Lord Vader might have had some insight; but that path clearly isn’t viable anymore. But he was curious. About how he got these memories, whose memories they even are, and who that red-skinned figure was.

“Maybe I should try to figure it out later.” Boba though. “I might still have some contacts, or some locations that would have the knowledge.” Boba reconsidered the state of the galaxy again however. “Well, sources that the New Republic haven’t purged yet, I hope.”

Boba continued to use his time pondering search vectors, until suddenly, a massive Mon Calamari Star Cruiser jumped into real space. Upon seeing the massive ship, Boba couldn’t help but whistle in appreciation. 

“Ha.” He chuckled. “That’s a lot bigger than your first ship Eclipse.” Boba paused for a moment. “Wait.” He started looking at his ship’s controls as he felt it begin to vibrate. “Wait, Wait, Wait.” He slammed his fists on the control board. “Why am I in fucking tractor beam?” He asked, loudly. He turned the comms back on and there was already someone waiting; expecting him to call.

“Calm down hunter.” The same comm agent from before spoke before Boba could say anything. “Jeez its all the same with you folk.”

Boba had to resist the urge to snark.

“We just thought that you would appreciate not having to worry about flying after what you went through.” She explained. “It also makes it easier for us.”

That piqued Boba’s interest. “Easier for you?” Boba asked. “How?”

“As per Commodore Eclipse’s orders, your ship is to be brought to Hanger RK.” The comm agent answered. “It was easier to just bring you there ourselves instead of having you fly there.”

“And why am I being brought there?” Boba asked the natural question.

“Someone important wanted to pick up the holocron in person.” She answered.

“Who?” Boba pressed.

“Above my paygrade.” The agent said. “Sorry. You will have to wait for it.”

Boba sat back up and put his hands across his chest in frustration. “No option but to wait,” he grumbled.

Boba’s Imperial shuttle was slowly dragged closer and closer to the capital ship. Very quickly, it became aware to Boba that the hanger he was going to was very special indeed. Not a single other fighter, or transport, or whatever entered or exited it. It was very clearly a private hanger meant for VIPs.

“Don’t I feel appreciated.” Boba joked.

Eventually, the ship entered the hanger and rested upon the floor. Looking through the windows of the cockpit, Boba could see a figure hidden in robes flanked by a firing squad.

“This New Republic feels a lot like the Empire.” Boba snarked. “Ah well. Let’s greet my clients.” He picked up the holocron and hooked a few explosives onto it. As he prepared the Deadman’s switch, he considered, “Well, at least I have this.”

Boba took the holocron with him and walked to the hanger doors. He didn’t hear any shooting or orders coming in yet, and he figured that was a good sign. The doors slowly lowered and Boba made sure that the holocron was as clearly visible as he could make it. No one said anything so Boba slowly walked down the ramp.

Once he was off the shuttle and within a few paces of the cloaked figure, Boba couldn’t help but speak out. “You know, I thought that the New Republic wanted to be better than the Empire. Wasn’t that point?” Boba gestured to the firing squad behind the figure. “This seems a bit close to stuff I saw from Lord Vader.”

The cloaked figure chuckled. “These guys?” The figure turned around, showing Boba his back with no fear. “These guys weren’t my choice. Juno kinda forced them on me.” The man turned back around to face Boba.

Boba’s eyes narrowed. That voice is familiar.

But then again, after his time in the sarlacc, most voices were familiar to him. “Oh really?” Boba asked. “And do tell” He gestured with his free hand. “Why were they forced on you?”

“In case you decide to be a problem.” The man answered.

“A problem?” Boba was confused.

“Yes. Boba Fett” He replied. Boba had to resist the urge to move as the man used his hands to take off his hood and reveal his face. “Now are you going to be a problem?” He asked again.

Upon seeing his face, Boba could only laugh. “I knew your voice was familiar.” Boba chuckled. “Luke Skywalker. Hero of the Rebellion. The Master Jedi who slayed the Dark Lords of the Empire.”

Luke’s face grimaced upon hearing the last one. “Yes well, that is among the many things that I am called now-a-days.” He shrugged. “As far as I am concerned, most of it isn’t warranted. There were many people who were far more important than me in our liberation of the galaxy.” Luke immediately refocused. “But enough about me. Let’s talk about you. I repeat my question.” Luke’s own eyes narrowed. “Are you going to be an issue?”

Boba could feel an unmistakable tension in the air. It almost reminded him of how he felt on the frigate. But unlike the sith acolytes, this aura was more controlled, more restrained. It didn’t imply danger, or violence; rather it was just a reminder to be careful.

At this moment, Luke reminded Boba of Lord Vader.

“No” Boba eventually answered. “No, I won’t be a problem.”

And like that, the aura was immediately gone. In fact, if Boba wasn’t so used to feeling this tension from his time around Lord Vader, he might have wonder if it even excited in the first place.

Luke, meanwhile, acted as if nothing was different at all. “Fantastic,” He clapped both hands.

The movements of his hands disheveled his robes and allowed Boba to clearly see a lightsaber. The same one that Luke used to free his friends and himself from Jabba the Hutt back on Tatooine. This was going to be difficult. Boba had said that he wouldn’t be a problem, but truthfully, he didn’t know.

Luke continued to talk though. He turned around to the firing squad and began to order them. “You all heard him.” He pointed a hand towards the exit. “Dismissed.”

One of them started to stutter out a response. “But, but, Commodore Eclipse…” He began.

Waving his hands placatingly, Luke interrupted his men. “I am sure that Juno’s reservations are well founded” he paused before adding. “Especially considered her history with Boba.” He smiled. “But I want to take him at his word. After all, a bounty hunter’s most important trait is their reputation with a client. And Boba still hasn’t finished his transaction with us. Besides, I dislike this sort of thing. He is right. This stuff does edge a little too close to the Empire’s methods for my tastes.” Luke finished.

The soldiers of the firing squad still didn’t look convinced though.

Frankly, to Boba’s eyes, it was less about whether or not they trusted him and more about wanting to ensure Luke’s safety. At that observation, Boba could only consider them all to have an overinflated sense of their own importance. As if a Jedi Master like Luke needed some rifleman to defend his chastity.

Luke could only sigh. “Look, if it helps, tell Juno that I technically out rank all of you” He paused. “And her.” Luke added as an afterthought. “If she makes an issue of it, tell her that I gave you all no choice.” 

The soldiers clearly didn’t like the situation, but could see that Luke was correct and they actually didn’t have a choice in the matter. Dejected, they slowly trundled to the exit. Once they were all gone, Luke turned around and focused on Boba again.

“Now that you aren’t surrounded by laser-happy gunmen, I’ll ask again. No issue between us?” Luke asked.

Boba shook his head and answered once again. “No. Whatever issue we had, it ended when Jabba the Hutt died. No client, no target.” He explained.

“Such simple beings you bounty hunters are.” Luke laughed. “So transparent in your self-interest, I can almost admire it. 

“If you say so.” Boba responded. He paused for a moment before finally asking. “So how did you know?”

Luke kept laughing. “Please. You hardly made it difficult.” He began to say. “I am sure you believed the new color scheme on the armor was enough to not give it away; after all a lot of people wear Mandalorian armor. But here is the thing,” Luke continued “the moment you got within the same town as Master Marek, he knew who you were. Your identity was never unclear and was never a mystery. He wouldn’t forget you; not after what you did.” Luke finished. 

“If he knew, why didn’t he kill me?” Boba asked.

“Because we aren’t Sith Boba. We try to be better. That was the point of everything we did up till now.” Luke answered.

“And if Starkiller wasn’t there?” Boba inquired. “Would you have known who I was?”

“First, please don’t call him Starkiller anymore.” Luke requested. “Second, Of course. The New Republic isn’t made up of morons. It wasn’t completely by luck that we beat the Empire.” He answered.

Boba took some time to consider what Luke had said. But then, he noticed Luke’s eyes begin to hover over the holocron. Instead of directing commenting on it however, Luke went about it the long way.

“With that sorted, Could I request a debrief from you?” Luke asked. “Afterall, you still are on contract with the New Republic, despite our past adventures together.” Luke joked. “What happened in that ship? I can see that you have the holocron, but I also see that you are the only one left.”

Boba, confident that nothing would happen to him, found a nearby seat and sat. When Luke choose not to move, Boba decided to begin his story. “Well, I guess purge might be the right word?” Boba asked himself out loud. 

“A purge?” Luke asked.

“This holocron led to the Sith doing what Sith always do.” Boba explained. “They fought, they killed, and they experimented on each other.”

Luke made no comment and asked for no clarification. He just stood and waited for Boba to continue.

“When we boarded the ship, we saw that the hanger was full of stormtroopers loading whatever transports they had left. After slaying all of them, we inferred that they were actually trying to escape.” Boba paused. “It wasn’t for a while until we learned why. Basically, the Dark Jedi attempted to use the knowledge on this holocron,” Boba pointed at it, “to create war beasts. Terrible Sith war beasts.” Boba took a break to breath. “And that came at the cost of massacring almost their entire garrison; Brutally and utterly”

Luke felt the need to interrupt here. “Was it these war beasts that killed the other bounty hunters?” He asked.

“Some of them.” Boba shrugged. “Some died to beasts, some died to imperials, and one died due to other reasons.”

“Other reasons?” Luke questioned.

“Sometimes death is a preferably mercy.” Boba answered. “Sometimes, death is the luxury.” He continued. “Trust me on that.”

Luke looked like that last comment brought up some memories. “Yes.” He finally agreed. “Sometimes it is.” He looked sadder than he had at any point in this entire conversation thus far. “Please, keep going,” he eventually requested. He walked towards a seat himself. 

“After navigating the ship’s interior, we eventually fought our way into a central hall. It was some sort of dueling room, I think.” Boba shrugged, “We found Dark Jedi fighting amongst themselves there.” Boba thought back to his memories as he struggled to explain what he saw. “Whether they were sparing or killing each other, I don’t know. But once we got past them, we finally got to the mediation room. In there, waited what I assume was an Sith inquisitor, who was ordered to keep the holocron safe and deliver it to someone.”

“Who and to whom?” Luke asked.

“The Sith guarding the holocron never gave me his name. Well, maybe he tried, but I never gave him the opportunity.” Boba answered. “In regards to who gave the orders, I believe he said the names Jerec and Lumiya.”

Luke’s face grew grim. “I see.” He looked at the holocron. “Quite the difficult situation you went through. And yet,” Luke pointed at the holocron, “you succeeded. Quite impressive.”

“I’ve killed jedi before. This was no different.” Boba replied.

Luke’s face stayed grim upon hearing that. “Hopefully, we can get you to stop hunting my kind then.”

“I will do whatever a client pays me to do, Master Skywalker.” Boba quipped.

“In that case, are you ready to finish your contract with us?” Luke asked.

Boba nodded. He subtly removed the explosives he trapped the holocron with and kicked it over to Luke.

“Careful.” Luke whined.

“Don’t worry.” Boba laughed. “This thing went through a lot more damage than that while it was in the ship.”

Luke picked it up and almost zoned out for a moment as he looked upon the red crystalline pyramid. However, he quickly blinked and brought himself back to reality. With a cough, he had something else to say. “I will order Juno to wire you the finds as soon as I see her again.” Upon seeing Boba nod, Luke also added, “You know, what you saw on that ship must have been truly terrible. Is there anything else you would like to say or perhaps ask?” he hinted.

“Smarmy bastard,” Boba thought.

But then, he truthfully did consider the implied permission that Luke gave him. To be completely fair, Boba did have a few questions plaguing him. What were these memories he kept seeing? What did the sarlacc actually do to him? And most importantly, who was that red near-human he saw? Boba sighed. Those were problems for himself to solve; at least for right now. Instead, Boba simply had a recommendation.

“Blow up that ship.” He said. “Don’t send anyone to search it. Don’t send anyone to investigate it. Don’t send anyone to recover it. Just destroy it.” Boba enunciated.

Luke slowly nodded. “Can do.” Luke looked behind Boba at the Imperial shuttle. “Uh, do you want a ride back to Tatooine… or wherever you want to go?” he asked.

“No.” Boba replied. “This is fine.” He turned around and began walking back to the shuttle.

“Are you sure that everything is fine between us?” Luke asked once again.

“Ya.” Boba said. “It was just a bad job.” 

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading my Story. Its my second one and I am still trying to figure all this out. I hope you enjoyed it!   
> Signed,   
> M.C. Deltat


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